[/caption]At least 19 people, including 14 policemen were killed and 73 others were injured on Sunday when a suicide bomber exploded himself at Islamabad's Melody Chowk, close to the Lal Masjid or Red Mosque where hundreds of people were attending a religious convention to mark the first anniversary of a military operation that killed more than 100 people in a week-long siege
The bomber was trying to walk towards the gathering and blew himself up when police confronted him, witnesses said.
Red Mosque clerics had been waging a campaign to impose a Taliban-style way of life in Pakistan and last year the radical students kidnapped several policemen, Chinese health workers and an alleged brothel owner. But a military operation was launched after female students from Jamia Hafsa, a seminary attached to Red Mosque, occupied a children's library, snatched rifles from paramilitary rangers and shot dead one member of the force.
After the military operation the seminary was demolished and Red Mosque was closed for prayers. It was opened on July 27, 2007, but again a suicide bomber killed 14 people, mostly policemen in the nearby Aabpara market. The mosque was closed and later in October, it was again opened for prayers after a Supreme Court order.
The deputy chief cleric of mosque Abdul Rashid Ghazi was killed in the massive military operation, while his elder brother and chief cleric Maulana Abdul Aziz and his wife and administrator of Jamia Hafsa were arrested.
More than 1,000 people have died in suicide attacks and bombings by Taliban-linked militants to avenge the raid at Red Mosque.
Comments
It is pity they let go hundred fanatics last July. Now they are free to blow themselves, and dozens of innocents alongs, in their quest for 72 virgins.