Police open probe into Pakistan attacks

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LAHORE, March 12 (AP): Investigators began probing whether al-Qaida was behind twin suicide attacks that killed 24 people in Pakistan's cultural capital as a new government prepared to take office, police said Wednesday.
The bombings on Tuesday were the first major terrorism attacks since the parties of slain opposition leader Benazir Bhutto and another former premier, Nawaz Sharif, announced Sunday they would form a coalition government and try to cut the powers of U.S.-backed President Pervez Musharraf.
The blasts happened about 15 minutes apart in different districts of Lahore, Sharif's stronghold. The first tore the facade from the seven-story Federal Investigation Agency building as staff were beginning their work day.
Although al-Qaida-linked militants in Iraq have regularly used vehicles to launch massive attacks on buildings, such damage has rarely been inflicted on a government building in Pakistan.
Provincial police chief Azhar Hasan Nadeem said it was not yet clear if al-Qaida was involved in the attack.
"Of course they have a huge organization, and they have a very vast network, but it would be premature to pinpoint exactly as to which particular organization is responsible," Nadeem told reporters Wednesday in Lahore.
A senior police investigator, Tasadaq Hussain, said efforts were under way to trace and capture those who orchestrated the attacks.
A spike in violence across the country has prompted some Pakistanis to question Musharraf's approach to countering al-Qaida and the Taliban. Musharraf's opponents say punitive military action has helped militants recruit more supporters and prompted more attacks.
In other violence, a government official said Wednesday that a mortar shell struck a house during fighting between security forces and militants in the northwest, killing five civilians and injuring nine.