Suicide bomber wounds 3 children in NW Pakistan

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(Agencies)
Updated: 2008-12-09 15:41

MINGORA, Pakistan -- A suicide bomber killed himself and wounded three children in a northwestern Pakistani town on Tuesday as people elsewhere in the Muslim nation celebrated the Eid al-Adha festival, military officials said.

The attack was in the Buner district, next to the troubled Swat valley, where Pakistani troops have killed hundreds of militants in the past year.

"The bomber got out of the car and blew himself up and wounded three children, but there has been no other fatalities," said a military intelligence official, speaking on the condition of anonymity.

More than 30 people were killed and many more maimed and wounded in two car bomb attacks in northwest Pakistan last week.

Security has been beefed up for the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha across Pakistan for fear of attacks by al Qaeda-linked and Taliban militants who have unleashed a wave of suicide attacks in response to military operations against them.

Forty-eight people were killed in a suicide attack during Eid in the northwestern town of Charsadda in December last year.

The surge in violence has raised concern about nuclear-armed Pakistan's stability as its civilian government struggles with a sharp economic downturn and pressure from India to widen its campaign against jihadi organisations in the wake of the militant attack that killed at least 171 people in Mumbai late last month.