ISLAMABAD: At least 50 people were killed and 145 injured when a suicide truck bomb carrying hundreds of kilograms of explosives devastated the heavily guarded Marriott Hotel in Pakistan’s capital yesterday, engulfing the building in flames.
Witnesses and officials said a large truck rammed the high metal gate of the hotel at about 8 p.m. (1400 GMT). The blasts left a large meters-deep crater in front of the main building. Rescuers ferried a stream of bloodied bodies from the gutted building — which was in danger of collapsing. The death toll could rise as many of the injured were in critical condition and people were still trapped inside the hotel.
Pakistan’s Dawn Television reported that three Americans and a Danish diplomat were among the dead, but these deaths are unconfirmed. Four Germans were also reported by the Dawn as injured.
Arab News confirmed that six Saudi Arabian Airlines employees were injured in the attack. Sixteen Saudi Arabian Airlines crew members were staying at the hotel, Saudi Ambassador Ali Awadh Asseri told Arab News.
“We evacuated all Saudi Arabian Airlines crew, which included eight nationals, to a secure hotel,” said Awadh Asseri. “There were no fatalities. The six who were injured — four among them were Saudi nationals and two non-Saudi airhostesses — are now recovering in a hospital.”
Two hospitals told Arab News that 10 foreigners were among those in their treatment, including one each from Germany, Saudi Arabia, Morocco and Afghanistan. Junior staffers of Marriott Hotel told Arab News that some US soldiers were staying at the hotel when the explosion took place.
Witnesses spoke of a smaller blast followed by a much larger one, which may have been gas lines that exploded following the attack.
Nobody claimed responsibility for the attack. Security agencies had reportedly warned the Interior Ministry of terrorist attacks targeting the Parliament building or the Prime Minister’s House but the bomber struck the Marriott Hotel.
According to sources, National Assembly Speaker Fahmida Mirza was hosting an iftar dinner reception in honor of President Asif Ali Zardari when the bomb went off. Many important personalities were among the guests.
“We had adopted all possible preventive measures to protect the hotel but the bomber selected the outer side of parking to attack,” the owner of the hotel, Sadaruddin Hashwani, told Arab News.
Pakistan, a US ally in the war on terror, has faced a wave of violence in recent weeks following army-led offensives against insurgents in its border regions.
Zardari and Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani strongly condemned the attack in a statement.
“This is terrorism and we have to fight it together as a nation,” Rehman Malik, the head of Pakistan’s Interior Ministry, told reporters.
— With input from Samir Al-Saadi
