KARACHI, 8 May 2004 — At least 15 worshipers were killed and scores of others were injured when a powerful bomb exploded at a Shiite mosque packed with worshipers here yesterday in a suspected suicide attack, police and hospital officials said.
President Pervez Musharraf condemned the blast as a “heinous act of terrorism” and ordered an immediate investigation to trace the culprits.
The attack occurred shortly after 1 p.m. at a mosque inside a government-run religious school, shattering windows and pocking the walls with shrapnel and splattered blood. Bits of flesh and pools of blood lay all around as rescue workers tended to the wounded.
The school, which houses students aged 4 to 18 years, has separate mosques for Sunni and Shiite worshipers. Witnesses said the school had closed early, as it normally does on Fridays. Most of the victims were adults who came to the mosque for prayers.
The bombing triggered violence and unrest in this port city. Hundreds of Shiite youths burned cars, petrol pumps and a government office in the city, which has been hit by frequent acts of terrorism and sectarian violence.
Tariq Jamin, deputy inspector general of Karachi police, said 15 people were killed in the bombing and more than 100 injured.
However, Dr. Raza Ali said 215 wounded were brought to Karachi’s Civil Hospital, of whom 45 were still hospitalized. Most of the rest were released after treatment for minor injuries or had been transferred to other hospitals. Sadir Durrani, a police explosives expert at the site of the blast at the Sindh Madrasatul Islam, said he had found no timing or radio devices, indicating it may have been caused by a suicide bomber.
Chief investigator Manzoor Mughal said no crater was found at the blast point, suggesting a person was carrying the bomb. Several injured people had described a man in a black robe and black turban who was sitting near the column where the bomb exploded. “We are still investigating, but it seems it was a suicide bombing,” he said.
One of the men injured in the blast described the devastation.
“I was inside the mosque for Friday prayers when a bomb exploded with a huge bang,” Kalbe Abbas, 23, said. “Something hit my arm, and I saw blood all over my body.”
Abbas said he could hear the cries of the injured people around him before stumbling out of the building. Aftab Sheikh, a senior politician responsible for law and order in Sindh province, blamed anti-state elements for the blast, but would not elaborate.
Sheikh said “today’s bomb attack was carried out by those people who were behind other terrorist attacks in Karachi.”
“I condemn this attack, it was a barbaric act,” he said.
Rescue officials piled blood-stained carpets outside the shattered mosque. Television footage from inside Civil Hospital showed victims lying on the floor, bleeding and dazed, as doctors and nurses hurried between them.
