PAKISTAN: Eleven including two judges killed in gun, suicide attacks on Islamabad court

Pakistan Today

At least 11 people, including two additional sessions judges were killed on Monday when unidentified assailants opened fire and then blew themselves in a court in the capital city’s F-8 area. “There was firing by two to three people followed by two suicide blasts which killed 11 people and wounded 25 others,” Islamabad police chief Sikandar Hayat told reporters. “All the attackers fled though one sustained injuries in the leg and back.” Twenty-five people were reportedly injured in the attack. Moreover, lawyers fled from their chambers seeking shelter from bullets as fear and panic gripped the premises. According to police, two blasts took place inside the court’s premises, one near the chambers of a judge and the other outside another office. Officers at the scene told AFP the incident began when a defendant was brought before the court and his associates tried to break him free. Another senior-ranking police official said the incident could be a terror attack but nothing could be said with certainty as yet. The hearings of cases scheduled for the day were postponed. Subsequently, police and special forces were deployed in the court and emergency was declared in hospitals. Policemen collect evidence from the site of a bomb attack at the district court. The death toll was confirmed by other police officials and the spokeswoman for the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS) Ayesha Isani. Roads around the court, located in a well-heeled residential sector of the city popular with foreign residents, were sealed off as police and paramilitary forces carried out a search operation. The dead include Session court judge Rafaqat Awan and a female lawyer Fiza.