PAKISTAN: Bomb in Italian restaurant popular with foreigners kills one woman and wounds eleven in Islamabad

Record ID: 357168

  • Title: PAKISTAN: Bomb in Italian restaurant popular with foreigners kills one woman and wounds eleven in Islamabad
  • Date: 16th March 2008
  • Summary: (BN14) ISLAMABAD, PAKISTAN (MARCH 15, 2008) (REUTERS) POLICEMEN
  • Embargoed: 31st March 2008 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Pakistan
  • Country: Pakistan
  • Topics: Crime / Law Enforcement,Domestic Politics
  • Reuters ID: LVA3618J6XO51AD75RZN478K2K21
  • Story Text: A bomb at an Italian restaurant in the Pakistani capital of Islamabad on Saturday (March 15) killed a Turkish woman and wounded 11 other people, including five Americans, police said.
    A witness said the explosion occurred in a garden dining area at the rear of the Luna Caprese restaurant, a well known haunt for expatriates, including diplomats, aid agency workers, and journalists.
    Police Deputy Inspector General Shahid Nadeem Baloch said the victim was a Turkish woman who worked for a relief agency, after television news channels had earlier identified her as an American nurse. Baloch said the bomb blast had left a crater, and ruled out any possibility that it had been a suicide attack.

    "A Turkish lady was brought to the hospital dead. Eleven people were injured. Five of them are from the U.S.A., one from Japan, one British, one Canadian and three Pakistanis," Dr. Shaukat Kiyani, executive director of the federal government services hospital told reporters.
    Pakistan has been battling Islamist militancy since joining the U.S.-led campaign against terrorism after the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States.
    More than 500 people have been killed this year in militant-related violence, including a wave of suicide bombings.
    Bombers have targeted U.S. diplomats several times in the past. David Foy, a diplomat at the U.S. consulate in Karachi was killed by a suicide car bomber in March 2006.
    Early last year a suicide bomber killed a security guard outside Islamabad's Marriott hotel, but attacks on soft targets like restaurants frequented by foreigners would mark a change in the militants' tactics.
    Pakistan has experienced months of political turmoil over opposition to President Pervez Musharraf.
    Musharraf's allies were routed in a parliamentary election last month.
    The campaign was overshadowed by the assassination in December of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto.
    The National Assembly will convene on Monday (March 17) for the first time since the election, and Musharraf is expected to invite the victors to form a coalition government, though it might end up forcing him from power.
    END
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