Pakistan:A suicide bomber struck at the gates of Pakistan's army headquarters yesterday, killing seven people and quickening the tempo of Islamist violence that is destabilising the country.
The lone bomber blew himself up at a checkpoint on an approach road to Army House in Rawalpindi, where president Pervez Musharraf was holding a meeting, a spokesman, Rashid Qureshi, said.
Gen Musharraf was in no danger from the blast, which killed two police officers, two soldiers and three passersby. Women and children in a passing minibus were among the dead and wounded.
"The police stopped the bomber before he got too far. We heard the blast in our office," Mr Qureshi said. There was no doubt the attack was linked to the Islamist violence that has rocked Pakistan since the summer, he said.
The siege of the radical Red Mosque in Islamabad in July triggered a string of attacks against military and political targets. Attacks in Rawalpindi last month killed 25 people, including employees of the Inter Services Intelligence agency.
Two weeks ago a suicide bomber hit a procession celebrating the return of opposition leader Benazir Bhutto, leaving 140 dead and hundreds wounded.
Yesterday Ms Bhutto vowed to continue campaigning but said she would hold no more processions.
The violence is rooted in North-West Frontier Province, where poverty, radical politics and anti-American sentiment have fused into a phenomenon known as Talibanisation.
The worst affected area is Waziristan, where al-Qaeda fugitives are hiding and the Pakistani army has deployed 100,000 troops. But now the unrest is spreading to other corners of the province.
Since Friday about 100 people have died in fighting between government forces and pro-Taliban militants in Swat, a valley north-east of Peshawar better known as a tourist resort.
Suicide bombers hit government patrols and beheaded captured soldiers.
The military has responded with helicopter attacks and artillery barrages.
Reuters adds:Pakistani chief justice Iftikhar Chaudhry yesterday reaffirmed an earlier Supreme Court ruling that former prime minister Nawaz Sharif be allowed to return from exile.
Sharif, whom Gen Musharraf ousted in a bloodless 1999 coup and later sent into exile, was blocked for several hours on his arrival at the international airport at Rawalpindi on September 10th.
He was put on a flight to Saudi Arabia a few hours later.