Rockets fired at US, UN offices

Reuters, ISLAMABAD

Six rockets were launched in a coordinated attack on US and UN offices in Pakistan's capital Islamabad yesterday, police said.

Police said only one injury was reported -- a Pakistani guard near the American Center was slightly injured by shrapnel -- and no one had claimed responsibility for the late morning blasts.

The attack came two days before UN sanctions backed by the United States were to go into effect against Afghanistan's ruling Taliban movement for not surrendering terrorism suspect Osama bin Laden.

The supreme leader of the Taliban, Mullah Mohammad Omar, condemned the rocket attacks.

"The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan has always condemned terrorism and continues to condemn it," Omar said a statement faxed to Reuters in the northwestern Pakistani town of Peshawar.

The attack also came exactly one month after prime minister Nawaz Sharif's government was ousted in a bloodless military coup, but there was no apparent connection as the overthrow by army chief General Pervez Musharraf was greeted with widespread support in Pakistan.

Sharif is in detention and has been accused of hijacking and kidnapping, which carry a death penalty.

A senior Islamabad district officer told Reuters that six rockets were believed to have been fired from vehicles in three different locations within a few minutes of each other at about 11:15am (2:15pm Taiwan time), but police said only four of the rockets could be accounted for.

"We have no suspects so far. It appears the rockets were aimed at the US and UN offices, but they were off target," said the officer, who asked not to be identified.

The vehicles used in the attack were believed to have been equipped with twin-barrel rocket launchers.

All caught fire after the rockets were launched, leading to some initial confusion about the number and nature of the blasts. Police originally thought some may have been car bombs.

One rocket hit a steel fence at the American Center with flying debris injuring the local guard. A vehicle was found burning just 90 meters away from the building.

A second rocket hit a World Food Program car but did not explode, while a third hit a nearby Pakistani government office, police said.

A fourth exploded when it hit the Margalla hills on the edge of Islamabad.

"We are collecting information but there seems to be no major human casualties," a senior police officer said.

One of the vehicles exploded near the Saudi-Pak Tower, which houses many UN agencies.

Another car, which had a UN license plate, caught fire near the US embassy in the heavily guarded diplomatic compound, which houses most of the embassies in Islamabad.

It was not known if the rockets in the vehicle were targeted at the US embassy, which was not hit in the attack.

The US-initiated sanctions ordered by the UN Security Council are to go into effect against the Taliban tomorrow unless it hands over Saudi-born bin Laden, wanted in the United States on charges of masterminding bomb attacks on two US embassies in Africa in 1998 that killed more than 200 people.

The imminent sanctions have already caused protests in Afghanistan, where the UN office in Kandahar was stoned during a demonstration by 50,000 people on Wednesday.