PESHWAR, Pakistan — A suicide bomber attacked a livestock
market in the suburbs of the violence-racked northwestern Pakistani city of
Peshawar on Sunday, killing a mayor who had opposed the Taliban and 11 other
people.
Abdul Malik, mayor of the village of Adazai, was with his
bodyguards at the market when the bomber struck. Peshawar police official
Sahibzada Muhammad Anees said Malik was the target.
Malik, who had survived previous attempts on his life by the
Taliban, had recently organized a tribal militia to keep militants from the
neighboring Khyber region out of his village, about 10 miles south of Peshawar.
“I saw the mayor accompanied by armed guards in the
market when the explosion took place,” said Imtiaz Khan, a resident who
suffered wounds to his left leg in the attack. “His bodyguards tried to
overcome the bomber before the blast.”
Police said 35 people were injured in the explosion. Eight
of the injured were in critical condition. Jafar Shah, who buys and sells
cattle at the market, said Malik should have known he was a potential target
and was endangering the lives of others by appearing at the market.
“Malik was responsible for the blood bath,” said
Shah, who suffered a gash to his shoulder. “He should not have come to the
market because he was under threat, and everybody knows the Taliban were
pursuing him to eliminate him.”
The attack is the latest in a series of strikes by Taliban
militants in retaliation for a large-scale military offensive that Pakistani
troops are carrying out against the Taliban in South Waziristan, the militant
group’s primary stronghold along the Afghan border.
Military officials say troops have much of South Waziristan
under their control and have entered one of the last Taliban havens, the town
of Makeen. Military commanders say more than 400 militants have been killed in
three weeks of fighting.
However, claims by the Pakistani army cannot be verified
because the government does not allow access to the conflict zone, except for
carefully supervised trips for foreign journalists.
Via McClatchy-Tribune News Service.
