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‘State of war’: warning from Pakistan’s defense minister after suicide attacks that killed twelve
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‘State of war’: warning from Pakistan’s defense minister after suicide attacks that killed twelve

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A suicide bomber killed 12 people in Pakistan’s capital on Tuesday, in a sharp escalation of militant violence that the defense minister said has pushed the country into a “state of war”.
Pakistani ministers accused neighboring Afghanistan of complicity in the bloodshed – a charge they denied – and promised retaliation if Afghan authorities failed to rein in the militants Islamabad said were responsible.
“We are in a state of war,” Defense Minister Khawaja Muhammad Asif said after the attack, the first on civilians in Islamabad in a decade.
“Bringing this war to Islamabad is a message from Kabul, to which Pakistan has full power to respond.”

Pakistan has been locked in a standoff with Afghanistan and India, waging a four-day war with the latter in May and then launching airstrikes in Afghanistan, including Kabul, last month in response to what it said was the presence of Pakistani militants there.

Failed peace talks followed subsequent skirmishes on the Pakistan-Afghanistan border.
No group has claimed responsibility for Tuesday’s attack, in which a suicide bomber blew himself up outside a busy lower court in Islamabad.
It happened hours after militants stormed a school near the Afghan border on Monday, killing three people.
Attackers were still trapped in the compound as of late Tuesday, while about 500 students and staff were trapped in another part of the complex.
Pakistan’s main jihadist group, Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan, also known as the Pakistani Taliban, denied involvement in the attacks.

Pakistani Taliban militants have focused their attacks on security forces in recent years.

The bomb killed twelve people and injured many more. Source: MONKEY / Ahsan Shahzad/AP

According to Armed Conflict Location and Event Data, a group that tracks attacks, no civilians have been hit in Islamabad in a decade.

Pakistan blames the Taliban

Islamabad says the Pakistani Taliban and other militants are based in Afghanistan, with support from India.
“We are absolutely clear that Afghanistan must stop them. In case of failure, we have no choice but to take care of the terrorists who are attacking our country,” Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi said, speaking at the site of the court bombing.
Naqvi said the school attackers were in contact with their supervisors in Afghanistan during the attack.
He said authorities were investigating the backers of the court bombing, adding that an attack in Islamabad “carried a lot of messages.”

“India unequivocally rejects the baseless and unsubstantiated allegations leveled by a clearly out-of-control Pakistani leadership,” the Indian Foreign Ministry said.

The Taliban government in Kabul said in a statement that it “expresses its deep sorrow and condemnation” over the attacks.
A spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment on Pakistan’s allegations.
Afghanistan denies that its territory is being used to attack other countries.
The attacks in Pakistan came a day after an explosion in the Indian capital that killed eight people.

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