Attacks fuel Pakistan crisis

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — Twin suicide bombs that killed at least 24 people and injured 200 in the eastern city of Lahore Tuesday deepened the crisis in the troubled nation and increased the pressure on embattled President Pervez Musharraf, blamed by many for instability in the country.

In Lahore, one bomb targeted the seven-story headquarters of the federal police, which investigate terrorism and human trafficking, and killed at least 16 officers, police officials said.

Another car bomb exploded at a house near the rented Lahore home of Asif Ali Zardari, the leader of the Pakistan People's Party, which won the most seats in last month's parliamentary elections. The blast had no clear target, killing a gardener and his two children at the home of a man who runs a low-key advertising company.

"The suicide bombers have started attacking residential areas, and no one knows if they will return home safe or not," said Khadam Hussain, whose daughter was at school near the blast.

Zardari told reporters that the blasts in Lahore were a conspiracy against the power-sharing agreement announced Sunday between his party and the party of former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif. Both Zardari and Sharif have said they want to negotiate with militants instead of just fight them — a policy that many security analysts say is doomed to failure.

If more blasts hit Lahore, pressure will only increase on Musharraf and the rest of the government. The city is the capital of Punjab province, the heartland of both Pakistan and its powerful army, and many analysts say if suicide blasts become regular here, the government is in danger of collapse.

Two other blasts have exploded in Lahore in recent months — one in January and one last week — but the city has suffered much less than any other major city from Islamic militants or random bomb blasts.

So far this year, more than 150 people have been killed in 11 major suicide bombings nationwide. Some analysts blamed the attacks Tuesday on Islamic militants from the country's tribal areas upset with the army fighting in the remote area near the border with Afghanistan.

"Most of the army soldiers in the operation against them are from Punjab," said Muhammad Amir Rana, the director of the Pak Institute for Peace Studies and a terrorism expert. "They want to bleed Lahore. And if they attack in Lahore, it will create more reaction than anywhere else in the country."

Musharraf, a key U.S. ally who seized power in a 1999 military coup, is trying to hold onto power despite a political crisis and a rash of bombings blamed on Islamic militants. Some Pakistanis say Musharraf has incurred militants' wrath by doing the West's bidding in the war on terror and by calling for the army to raid a militant mosque last July.

Musharraf is also facing political pressure. Sharif and Zardari have agreed to restore within a month the senior judges fired by Musharraf.

These judges, removed by Musharraf when he declared emergency rule Nov. 3, could take up a series of challenges to Musharraf's continued rule, and could even rule that Musharraf's presidential election last fall was illegitimate.

Also on Tuesday, Musharraf called for the new parliament to take its oath on Monday. The opposition parties have not yet formally announced who will be their candidate for prime minister, but increasingly, Zardari is being mentioned as a leading choice.

Zardari, the widower of slain opposition leader Benazir Bhutto, did not run in the Feb. 18 elections, but he could win a parliamentary seat in a by-election and then be voted in by the parliament as prime minister, to replace a temporary prime minister.