30 injured in blast at pro-Taleban group’s office

PESHAWAR — A suicide bomber attacked the offices of a pro-Taleban group at a madrassa in a tribal area yesterday, local officials said, wounding 30 people.
Only the bomber was killed in the attack at the madrassa in the Khyber Agency, local official Rafaqat Gul said, revising an earlier toll of 10 dead given by senior security officials based in Peshawar.
It was the second attack in a week. The attack targeted the offices of Tanzeem Amar Bil Maruf Wa Nahi Al Munkar (Organisation for the Promotion of Virtue and Suppression of Vice), led by pro-Taleban cleric Haji Namdar, who escaped unharmed.
“The bomber entered the madrassa and blew himself up among dozens of people,” Gul said. The blast occurred in the remote mountainous neighbourhood of Takia Chowk in Khyber, a known hub of pro-Taleban groups.
Earlier, two high-ranking security officials based in Peshawar said 10 people had been killed and 15 others wounded in the attack. “The first report we received after the blast said 10 people were killed and around a dozen wounded,” one security official said. Another official confirmed the account. Witnesses said hundreds of people had gathered at the madrassa for morning lessons, followed by a fund-raising event for Taleban fighters in Afghanistan.
“As people were handing out their contributions, a boy aged around 17 stood up with a pistol in his hand, pretending to offer the weapon as a donation,” one witness, Mohammad Yaqub, said. “Then he suddenly blew up, I fell on the floor and fainted,” said Yaqub, who sustained stomach wounds. “I saw blood everywhere. I was also covered in blood and I thought many people were killed and I was lucky that I was still alive,” another witness, Haji Awal Khan, said. “It was a very powerful explosion. People were lying on the floor in a pool of blood.”
Last Friday, four people including two policemen were killed in a car bombing in Mardan, ending an almost six-week lull in militant attacks. Local officials said it was the first attack on a pro-Taleban outfit which could be linked to a turf rivalry between rebel groups in the tribal areas. Two United Nations employees were kidnapped in the region by militants last week. They were later rescued in an operation by local militia and paramilitary troops.
Sources said Haji Namdar’s group was unhappy over the kidnapping episode and warned Taleban from South Waziristan, loyal to militant commander Baitullah Mehsud, to refrain from such activities in his areas. “Today’s suicide attack could be an outcome of this rivalry,” a source in his group said.