PESHAWAR, Aug 26 (Agencies): Gunmen opened fire on the top US diplomat in northwestern Pakistan early Tuesday as she left for work in her armored vehicle, police and embassy officials said. No one was killed in the attack.
Lynne Tracy, principal officer for the consulate in the bustling city of Peshawar, was 100 yards from her house when two men with AK-47s jumped out of their dark blue Land Cruiser and sprayed her car with dozens of rounds of ammunition.
Her driver reversed the vehicle and peeled back to her home, said Arshad Khan, the local police chief and senior investigator in the case.
The brazen attack came hours after the breakup of Pakistan's ruling coalition government, a fracture that could concentrate more power into the hands of a party that says it is committed to supporting the US war on terror.
The government Monday announced a ban on the Pakistani Taliban - blamed for a wave of suicide bombings in recent days - and hours earlier rejected a cease-fire offer in the Bajur tribal region by the militants. Khan said Tracy's Land Cruiser was damaged, but only slightly, thanks to its heavy armor.
Though no one was killed by the gunfire, a rickshaw driver was hurt when his three-wheeled taxi was hit by the consulate vehicle, he said. The man was hospitalized, but the extent of his injuries was not immediately known.
Militant activity is rampant in parts of northwest Pakistan, a rumored hiding place of Osama bin Laden, though mainly in tribal regions where US officials say insurgents have found safe havens in which to plan attacks on American and NATO forces across the border in Afghanistan.
Peshawar, a crowded, dusty city, has not been immune, and concerns about militant activity in and around it prompted the government to stage a paramilitary offensive in neighboring Khyber tribal region earlier this year.
Talat Masood, a political and military analyst, said American and other diplomats seen as allies in the war on terror, could increasingly be the targets of militant attacks, especially in the next few weeks.
Masood did not think Western allies should scale back their presence, however, saying that would only embolden the militants and demoralize Pakistanis.
There have been a string of suicide bombings since Pervez Musharraf resigned as president after nearly nine divisive years in power just over a week ago.
The Taliban claimed to be behind a twin suicide bombing at a weapons manufacturing complex near the federal capital, Islamabad, that killed 67 people - one of the largest terrorist attacks ever in the country.
