December 21, 2007
Mosque Bombing Kills At Least 50 In Pakistan
UPDATED.
At least 50 people were killed in Pakistan today when a bomb exploded inside a mosque during the celebration of Eid al-Adha, a Muslim holiday marking the end of the annual pilgrimage to Mecca.
Worshippers inside the Islamabad mosque were observing the holiday with Aftab Ahmed Khan Sherpao, Pakistan's former interior minister, whose political party has been targeted before. Sherpao and his family were not injured in today's bombing, but he was also targeted in an April suicide attack near Islamabad that killed nearly 30 people.
"It was a massacre," Sherpao told the New York Times. "I can tell you that." Sherpao is running in the parliamentary elections set for mid-January, which will likely change the balance of power in Pakistan. (BBC News has a profile of Sherpao.)
President Pervez Musharraf lifted a state of emergency there less than a week ago, and yesterday Musharraf called for unity before next month's elections. "I join you in the development and progress of the country as a public representative and a democratic president," he said in a national address.
But in addition to the spate of violence targeting political leaders in recent months, the upcoming elections are already being marred by allegations of unfair practices and fraud. New York-based watchdog group Human Rights Watch said earlier this week that free and fair elections are "impossible" in Pakistan due to Musharraf's "dismantling of an independent judiciary" and "crackdown on the vocal lawyers' movement" critical of his administration, AFP reports. The group's report is available here.
Meanwhile, former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto has asked officials to crack down on what she describes as an effort on the part of the country's military intelligence to pressure members of her opposition party to drop out of the parliamentary elections. "We demand that the Election Commission should take notice of such things to ensure free and fair elections," she said, according to AP. Addressing the intelligence agencies, she added, "This is not your job to indulge in politics."
