Islamabad: Nearly eight people were killed and 25 injured on Monday when a suicide bomber rammed his explosive-laden motorcycle into a minibus ferrying trainee military doctors in a high-security area near the Pakistani army headquarters in Rawalpindi.
The explosion occurred at 7.15 AM outside the gate of the army's National Logistics Cell on a road connecting the Royal Artillery Bazar to the General Headquarters in the nearby garrison city.
"It was a suicide attack... a man on a motorcycle rammed into the bus," a military official said.
The blast completely destroyed the bus carrying trainee doctors from the Army Medical College to the Combined Military Hospital and some other vehicles, turning them into a mangled heap of metal.
Eyewitnesses said that about eight persons were killed. The military, however, said four of its personnel, including an officer, had died.
"It was a very powerful explosion. I saw a big ball of fire and smoke," said a shopkeeper.
Rescue workers and ambulances rushed to the site soon after the blast, and security forces sealed off the area. Journalists and passers-by were sent away from the site as investigators scoured the area for clues.
The suicide bombing, the seventh to rock the city in the last six months, came just hours after security agencies sounded an alert in Islamabad and Rawalpindi against possible attacks by militants to avenge the military operation against Islamic extremists in Swat and South Waziristan.
On Dec 27, former premier Benazir Bhutto was killed in a gun and suicide attack during an election rally in the city.
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