Police are preparing a sketch of a suicide car bomber who struck outside a US consulate in Pakistan, killing a US diplomat and three other people, a police official said yesterday.
US authorities have named the two consulate staff killed in the explosion in downtown Karachi on Thursday as David Foy, a facilities maintenance officer, and his Pakistani driver Iftikhar Ahmed. Another 52 people were also injured by the blast.
Karachi police chief Niaz Siddiqui said investigators were preparing a sketch of the bomber based on surveillance camera images from the consulate and neighboring Marriott Hotel, as well as eyewitness accounts of survivors.
Another police investigator said on condition of anonymity because of the sensitive nature of the probe that footage from the closed-circuit cameras revealed the bomber to be a man in his 30s with a trim beard.
The bomber parked a white Toyota Corolla sedan in a street linking the consulate with the hotel which is commonly used as additional hotel parking space, he said.
In the footage, the bomber is seen arguing with a paramilitary soldier seconds before he rammed his car into Foy's sports utility vehicle as it drove by, the official said.
The bomber's car had a falsified chassis number and stolen license plates, the official said.
Interior Minister Aftab Khan Sherpao told Pakistan's Geo television yesterday that the consu-late's security camera revealed the bomber parked his car 20 minutes before he reversed into Foy's SUV.
US President George W. Bush said from neighboring India on Thursday the terrorist attack would not deter him from visiting Pakistan's capital Islamabad, which is about 1,600km north of Karachi, yesterday for a weekend visit.
Siddiqui said security in Karachi had been increased with additional police and paramilitary troops deployed at foreign restaurants and businesses.
All roads leading to the consulate and European consulates have been blocked with shipping containers, he said.
A dozen FBI agents inspected the blast site late on Thursday using flashlights as part of the joint US-Pakistan investigation, police said.
No group claimed responsibility for the bombing, but Karachi is a hotbed of Islamic militancy and past attacks have been blamed on al-Qaeda-linked militants.
ROCKY RELATIONS: The figures on residents come as Chinese tourist numbers drop following Beijing’s warnings to avoid traveling to Japan The number of Chinese residents in Japan has continued to rise, even as ties between the two countries have become increasingly fractious, data released on Friday showed. As of the end of December last year, the number of Chinese residents had increased by 6.5 percent from the previous year to 930,428. Chinese people accounted for 22.6 percent of all foreign residents in Japan, making them by far the largest group, Japanese Ministry of Justice data showed. Beijing has criticized Tokyo in increasingly strident terms since Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi last year suggested that a military conflict around Taiwan could
A pro-Iran hacking group claimed to breach FBI Director Kash Patel’s personal e-mail inbox and posted some of the contents online. The e-mails provided by the hacking group include travel details, correspondence with leasing agents in Washington and global entry, and loyalty account numbers. The e-mail address the hackers claim to have compromised has been previously tied to Patel’s personal details, and the leaked e-mails contain photos of Patel and others, in addition to correspondence with family members and colleagues. “The FBI is aware of malicious actors targeting Director Patel’s personal email information,” the agency said in a statement on
RIVALRY: ‘We know that these are merely symbolic investigations initiated by China, which is in fact the world’s most profligate disrupter of supply chains,’ a US official said China has started a pair of investigations into US trade practices, retaliating against similar probes by US President Donald Trump’s administration as the superpowers stake out positions before an expected presidential summit in May. The move, announced by the Chinese Ministry of Commerce on Friday, is a direct mirror of steps Trump took to revive his tariff agenda after the US Supreme Court last month struck down some of his duties. “China expresses its strong dissatisfaction and firm opposition to these actions,” a ministry spokesperson said in a statement, referring to the so-called Section 301 investigations initiated on March 11.
When a hiker fell from a 55m waterfall in wild New Zealand bush, rescuers were forced to evacuate the badly hurt woman without her dog, which could not be found. After strangers raised thousands of dollars for a search, border collie Molly was flown to safety by a helicopter pilot who was determined to reunite the pet and the owner. A week earlier, an emergency rescue helicopter found the woman with bruises and lacerations after a fall at a rocky spot at the waterfall on the South Island’s West Coast. She was airlifted on March 24, but they were forced to
RSS