At least 11 persons are reported to have been killed in a suicide bomb attack on a rented building of the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) of Pakistan in the residential Model Town area of Lahore on the morning of March 8, 2010. The large quantity of explosive used brought down the entire building.
This is the first terrorist attack in Lahore this year. Last year, there were five as follows:
15 October: Terrorists attacked offices of law enforcement agencies.
12 June: A prominent anti-Taliban cleric killed by a suicide bomber at his religious school
27 May: A car bomb attack on police buildings killed 23 persons.
30 March: Gunmen attacked a police academy, killing eight people
3 March: Gunmen killed six police guards in an ambush of the Sri Lankan cricket team
The latest attack has taken place after an interval of about five months. There are two possibilities--- either it was carried out by the Terhrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) to demonstrate that it still had the capability to attack targets in the non-tribal areas despite the losses suffered by it since the beginning of this year -- including the reported but unconfirmed death of its Amir Hakimullah Mehsud after he was injured in a missile strike by a Drone (unmanned) plane of the US in January -- or it was carried out by the anti-Shia Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LEJ) in retaliation for the reported death of its leader Qari Mohammad Zafar in a US Drone strike in North Waziristan on February 24, 2010. The greater possibility is that the latest attack was carried out by a bomber of the LEJ, which has been operating jointly with the TTP and Al Qaeda and which has the capability for spectacular strikes in Lahore.
Pakistan has experienced a wave of violence since 2007 in which nearly 3,000 people have been killed in bomb attacks and other terrorist operations across the country.
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