By IANS,
Islamabad : Seven people were killed and 13 injured Friday when a suicide bomber struck at an air force base in Pakistan’s Attock district while eight people were injured in a bombing outside a restaurant in Peshawar.
The bombings took place as the army continued to tighten its grip in the country’s restive northwest region dominated by Taliban fighters.
A suicide bomber riding a bicycle blew himself up at a security checkpost near Pakistan Aeronautical Complex in Kamra.
A police official told Geo TV that seven people, including two securitymen, were killed while the injured were taken to Attock Hospital.
The Pakistan Aeronautical Complex at Kamra is the country’s major air force maintenance and research hub, Dawn News reported.
Some foreign military experts have suggested it as a possible place to keep aircraft that can carry nuclear warheads. The army has denied that the facility is tied to the programme.
A second blast took place in Peshawar’s residential Hayatabad area Friday.
Eyewitnesses told DawnNews that the blast was heard in front of the city’s popular Swan restaurant.
The front wall of the restaurant was damaged and car parts littered the area, suggesting that it was a car bomb blast.
Police say at least eight people have been injured in the blast.
The bombing comes just a day after a senior Pakistani Army officer, who was the head of the UN peacekeeping mission in Sudan, was gunned down along with another soldier.
Brigadier Moinuddin Ahmed, who was former deputy director general military operations, was killed by gunmen who ambushed his jeep.
Over 170 people have been killed in the latest wave of militant violence, which started with a suicide bombing at the offices of the UN World Food Programme in Islamabad Oct 5. Five employees of the agency were killed.
The most audacious attack came on Oct 10 when 10 terrorists in military uniform laid siege to the Pakistan Army’s General Headquarters in Rawalpindi. At least 19 people, including nine raiders, died in the 22-hour standoff. One militant was arrested.
On Oct 15, gunmen wearing suicide vests stormed two police academies and the offices of Pakistan’s Federal Investigation Agency in the eastern city of Lahore. A car bomber struck a police station in the northwestern town of Kohat. At least 38 people including 11 insurgents were killed in a single day.
A twin suicide bombing Oct 20 at the International Islamic University here killed seven people.