Bomb blasts rock Peshawar

PESHAWAR - At least 14 persons were killed and 35 others injured as two separate bomb blasts rocked Peshawar on Saturday in what appeared to be the first retaliation for the operation against militants in Swat Valley.
According to police officials, the first blast took place in Kakshal area at around 1:15 pm. They said the bomb had been planted in a car parked outside a motor sale centre at Circular Road near Asia Gate. It was a high-intensity explosive material weighing around 30kg.
According to eyewitnesses, three of the killed persons died on the spot while 10 succumbed to their injuries in different hospitals. They said the blast also set a number of nearby shops, houses and parked vehicles on fire.
They further disclosed that a school bus carrying handicapped kids, passing through the road at the time of the explosion, was also damaged in the incident.
Sources in hospitals also confirmed the death of 13 persons including four schoolgoing children and two women.
SSP Coordination while talking to the media disclosed that three suspected persons had been arrested from the site.
The second blast took place outside a cloth market in Gora Bazaar of Saddar area at 9:00 pm in which a child was killed and three others including a woman were injured.
Police and eyewitness said that an unknown person came and placed a shopping bag near the cloth shop, which exploded with a big bang. The blast was so severe that it jolted the entire area and caused severe fear and panic among the people. Those who were injured included a child, a woman and her husband who were shifted to Lady Reading Hospital.
Police and officials of the secret agencies also rushed towards the site and cordoned off the area. They also collected evidence from the blast site. An official of the bomb disposal squad Khurshid Khan told TheNation that bomb was locally made and had one kg explosive material.
No one has claimed responsibility for the blasts so far. However, it is believed that Taliban militants were behind the incident.
Agencies add: The Peshawar car bomb also destroyed an internet cafe and tore through a bus carrying handicapped children, police said.
The Interior Ministry on Saturday ordered a state of high alert across the capitals of the four provinces after the attacks in Peshawar.
Television images showed several vehicles burning fiercely, and a stricken white-and-green bus that had been dropping handicapped children at their homes around the city.
Safwat Ghayur, a senior police official, said one of a string of shops wrecked by the blast was an internet cafe - a favourite target for extremists who consider the web a source of moral corruption.
Ghayur said the cafe had received several threats and even been attacked recently by gunmen.
No group immediately claimed responsibility, but an intelligence official in Islamabad told CBS News that investigators were probing links to the militant Taliban movement in the Waziristan region.
The intelligence official who spoke to CBS News on condition of anonymity said the attack appeared to be in retaliation for the ongoing operation by the military in Swat Valley where more than 800 Taliban militants are believed to have been killed in the past eight days.