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Friday, October 3, 2003

Five Shias killed in Karachi bus attack

Agence France-Presse
Karachi, October 3

At least five Shia Muslims were on Friday shot dead and seven injured while
travelling to a mosque for Friday prayers in Pakistan's port city Karachi,
police said.

"Two men riding on a motorbike opened fire on their passenger van as they
were going for Friday prayers," Karachi city police chief Tariq Jamil told
AFP.

"Five people were killed on the spot while seven were injured. Three of them
are in a serious condition," he added.

He said it was a sectarian killing.

The victims were employees of a defence research body called Space and Upper
Atmospheric Research Organisation (SUPARCO). They routinely travelled to a
local mosque on Friday, Islam's holy day, to offer prayers, Jamil said.

A Shia political party blamed the attack on two outlawed Sunni extremist
outfits.

"Lashkar-e-Jhangavi (LJ) and Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan (SSP) are the local
operators of Al-Qaeda and this is part of the appeal made by Al-Zawahiri to
topple Pervez Musharraf's government," Hasan Turabi, regional chief of the
Shia Tehrik-e-Islamia group, told AFP.

"I fear more incidents of this nature will occur and I demand that operation
should be conducted not only on the border with Afghanistan but also against
local Al-Qaeda operators," Turabi said.

Musharraf last year banned LJ and SSP in an effort to curb sectarian
violence which has claimed the lives of some 4,000 people in the past few
years.

© Hindustan Times Ltd. 2003.
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