The five coordinated terror strikes on Thursday Oct 15 at three key Pakistan cities are seen as a warning to the Zardari government which is planning an offensive in South Waziristan. The strikes at Lahore, Kohat and Peshawar left at least 38 dead and scores injured. Only last week Pakistan Taliban militants targetted the army’s GHQ in Rawalpinid and left about 20 dead including a Brigadier.
These deadly staccato series of attacks have raised fresh doubts about Pakistan’s ability to curb Islamist insurgency, which is fast spreading across the country.
The first target was the Federal Investigation Agency, a law enforcement branch. Next, gunmen — some strapped with explosives — attacked a police training school. Both were targetted about two years back. A third group stormed a police commando training center, where some militants fired shots and tossed grenades from a roof and others took trainees’ families hostage in a residential area of the vast campus.
Almost simultaneously, a suicide car bombing killed three police officers and seven civilians at a police station in Kohat. As dusk fell, a fifth blast rocked government workers’ residences in Peshawar.
The Pakistan Taliban, which had carried out the attack on GHQ, has claimed responsibility for the Thursday attacks.
Rehman Malik, the Interior Minister, called these attacks a "guerrilla war." Others portrayed the attacks as evidence of links between various militant factions, including those within the restive tribal region along the border with Afghanistan and those in the interior.
