Five bombs used in bid on Musharraf's life: probe report
(Updated at 2140 PST)
ISLAMABAD: Pakistani investigators are questioning President Pervez Musharraf's security officers over a bid to assassinate him by blowing up a bridge used by his motorcade at the weekend, ministers said Tuesday, sources said quoting initial investigation report.
"People responsible for providing security to the president are being questioned," Interior Minister Faisal Saleh Hayat told. "The main focus of the investigations is how the explosives were placed under the bridge and whether there were any security lapses."
Five bombs were planted under the bridge and detonated almost simultaneously, Information Minister Sheikh Rashid said. It was the second attempt on General Musharraf's life in less than two years. Musharraf's car had just driven over the bridge as he travelled from Chaklala air base to his Army House residence near military headquarters in Rawalpindi when the bridge was wrecked by a huge explosion.
The amount of explosives used was enough to make 100 bombs, Hayat said. "The intensity of the explosives was very high. With such an amount you can make one bomb or 10 or 100," he said. The blasts ripped off a heavy layer of concrete on the bridge, exposing iron bars that were badly twisted by the impact.
"The timing of the blast and the place clearly show that the president was the target," Hayat said. No arrests have been made, and no-one has claimed responsibility publicly. "This type of device was never used in the country in the past," Rashid told AFP, adding they were "highly sophisticated."
"They were planted by the most expert people," Rashid said. No-one was injured in the attack, which came less than four hours after Indonesian President Megawati Sukarnoputri arrived in Islamabad. It also preceded by three weeks the visit of six heads of state to Islamabad for a regional South Asian summit. US Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage telephoned Pakistani Foreign Minister Khurshid Mahmud Kasuri to convey Washington's concern and express relief that Musharraf, a key US ally in its war on terror, survived. Musharraf blamed Islamic extremists for the bomb, which he said was "certainly a terrorist act".
Hayat cited opponents of recent peace moves with arch-rival India and "terrorist, extremist and fundamentalist threats" as possible perpetrators. "The recent developments in the region and peace moves with India could be an eyesore also to certain elements," he said. Authorities have "revamped" security arrangements for Musharraf, Prime Minister Zafarullah Jamali and other VIPs.
"There is a heightened state of alert to prevent any other incident," Hayat said. A separate police-civilian team and a military team are investigating the blast, the minister said. Musharraf escaped a similar attack in the southern port city of Karachi in April last year when Islamic extremists attempted to blow up a van as his motorcade passed.
Three of the would-be assassins were convicted in October of trying to kill the president and jailed for 10 years. A member of the paramilitary Rangers was also accused of involvement in the 2002 attack. Musharraf, who seized power in a bloodless coup in October 1999, has infuriated Islamic hardliners by backing the US-led campaign that ousted the Taliban in neighbouring Afghanistan two years ago.
He has also outlawed 13 Islamic militant organisations, of which six were banned as recently as last month. Extremists also feel betrayed by Musharraf's pledge to curb the passage of rebels into Indian-controlled Kashmir to fight Indian forces and the initiation of a ceasefire along the Line of Control dividing Kashmir. |
