'Accidental' blast kills three and rattles nerves in city targeted by Taleban

Published on Saturday 5 December 2009 18:53

AN ACCIDENTAL blast destroyed a fast-food restaurant in north-west Pakistan yesterday, killing at least three people and unnerving a city targeted by militants.

Police initially said a bomb had exploded near a fast-food restaurant in Peshawar, but later officials said it was an accidental blast.

"We did not find any substance which indicated a bomb," said Peshawar police chief Liaqat Ali Khan.

Pakistan's army faces a stubborn Taleban insurgency on its own soil and mounting US pressure to root out Islamist fighters in tribal border areas.

In a reminder of serious security challenges the army faces, militants attacked a mosque near Pakistan's army headquarters in Rawalpindi on Friday, killing at least 40 people, including army officers, just a 30-minute drive from the capital Islamabad.

Peshawar has been hit the hardest by bombings blamed on militants.

Standing at the scene of yesterday's blast, where people on the second floor of a burning building pleaded for help, taxi driver Noorzada Khan tried to make sense of all the violence that has kept residents at home and deprived him of business.

"They're professional killers. They're doing all this for money. They must be funded from outside. They cannot run such things alone," he said.

Foreign minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi condemned the latest wave of violence, adding that "such reprehensible acts can never defeat our national resolve to fight out terrorism and militancy".

On Friday night, up to 40 militants attacked an army checkpoint, killing one soldier, a security official said.

Soldiers at the checkpoint on a bridge in Wana, the main town in the Islamist bastion of South Waziristan, retaliated after coming under fire, said the security official. The military has said it made gains in a major offensive in October in South Waziristan.

However, militants have carried out retaliatory bombings, killing hundreds of people and pressuring the increasingly unpopular Pakistani president, Asif Ali Zardari, to neutralise the insurgency as he fights for his political survival.

Some Pakistanis seem to be losing confidence in the security forces.

"How do they enter Peshawar city with explosives or explosive-laden vehicles? What are police or other agencies doing?" asked university student Tahir Khan.

"People hate the Taleban. But someone has to give us security and control them or eliminate them."

US President Barack Obama highlighted Pakistan's struggle against militants last week when outlining his plans to send 30,000 more troops to Afghanistan.

He called on Pakistan to crack down harder on militants to help US troops fight the Taleban in Afghanistan.

He warned that Washington would not tolerate Pakistan allowing its territory to be a safe haven for militants.