Suicide car blast in Lahore kills 23

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AHORE: Gunmen detonated a car bomb near police and intelligence agency offices on Lahore’s Fatima Jinnah road Wednesday, killing 23 people and wounding more than 100, officials said.

At least four men with rifles stepped out from the car and opened fire on the intelligence agency building, then set off a massive blast when security guards returned fire, officials said.

Interior Minister Rehman Malik suggested the attack could be retaliation for the government's military offensive to rout Taliban militants from the northwestern Swat Valley.

Wednesday's attack was the third major strike in Lahore in recent months.

No one immediately claimed responsibility for the latest bombing. Police said one suspect was detained.

Raja Riaz, a senior minister in the Punjab provincial government, told reporters that about 30 people died. Fayyaz Ranjha, a senior health official, told Pakistan Television that at least 116 people were wounded. Police put the number of injured at 250.

The explosion sheared the walls off buildings in a main business district. TV footage showed bleeding bystanders and emergency workers carrying the injured toward ambulances.

‘The moment the blast happened, everything went dark in front of my eyes,’ witness Muhammad Ali said. ‘The way the blast happened, then gunfire, it looked as if there was a battle going on.’

Sajjad Bhutta, a senior government official in Lahore, told reporters that a car carrying several gunmen pulled up in a street between offices of the emergency police and the Inter-Service Intelligence.

‘As some people came out from that vehicle and starting firing at the ISI office, the guards from inside that building returned fire,’ he said. As the firing continued, the car suddenly exploded, he said.

The ISI and police buildings were both badly damaged. An AP reporter saw dozens of troops entering the ISI building to supervise the rescue work, while gunshots were heard from inside the building even one hour after the blast.

Television footage showed officers dragging a black-shirted man from the scene.

Malik blamed the attack on militants that government forces are fighting in the Swat Valley and the Federally Administered Tribal Areas near Afghanistan.

'These terrorists were defeated in FATA and Swat and now they have come here,' he told reporters.