Mosque blast kills four as thousands mourn clerics
Meanwhile, thousands of people mourned two Sunni Muslim clerics who were gunned down in the volatile southern city of Karachi, and authorities rounded up scores of people with links to militant groups to forestall more attacks.
Pakistan has already banned religious gatherings and stepped up security nationwide after a bout of violence in the past 10 days that has spoiled the US-backed government’s recent claims to be winning its war against terrorism.
Punjab province Law Minister Raja Basharat Illahi said four people, including the bomber, were killed in the latest attack at the Husainia Hall mosque in the ancient walled part of Lahore during prayers on Sunday evening.
Eight others were injured in what was the third bombing against a religious target in Pakistan this month.Officials said a man carrying a briefcase tried to enter the Shi’ite mosque but was blocked by security guards.
A bomb in the briefcase exploded after a scuffle, during which one of the guards opened fire. Between 70 and 80 people were inside the mosque at the time.
“Our two security guards were martyred and the suicide bomber was killed,” said witness Sajjad Bhutta. The other dead man was a passer-by.
The bombing was the third this month against a religious target in Punjab - an apparent exchange of brutal sectarian assaults.
On October 1, a suicide bombing at a Shi’ite mosque killed 31 people in Sialkot city. Six days later, a car bombing at a gathering of Sunni radicals in Multan city killed 40 people.
No group said it had carried out those attacks, which prompted authorities to ban religious gatherings nationwide - except for Friday prayers at mosques.
An intelligence official said more than 125 Pakistanis with links to outlawed extremist groups were detained for questioning over the weekend in connection with the bombings in Sialkot and Multan.
They were picked up in raids on homes, mosques and Islamic seminaries in cities including Multan, Jhang, Lahore and Rawalpindi, the official, based in Multan, said on condition of anonymity. None were senior militant leaders.
Adding to the tensions, on Saturday two prominent Sunni clerics, Mufti Jamil and Nazir Ahmed Taunsvi, were gunned down in Karachi, triggering night-time riots by their followers who set fire to at least four vehicles.
Some 10,000 mourners gathered at an Islamic seminary where funeral prayers for Jamil were held amid tight security, with police sharpshooters on rooftops and riot police deployed outside gas stations and banks.
A few hundred youths threw stones at police, who fired tear gas and a few shots in the air to disperse them.
Jamil was known as a pro-Taliban scholar. He was part of a delegation that travelled to Afghanistan after the September 11, 2001, attacks in America to try and persuade Taliban leaders to hand over Osama bin Laden.
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