Another Attempt On Pakistan Chief

Two massive suicide bombs exploded Thursday moments after President Gen. Pervez Musharraf's motorcade passed, the second assassination attempt against him in 11 days, officials said. The president's car was damaged but he was unhurt. At least 14 people were killed, including two attackers, and 46 were wounded.

The blasts came just a day after Musharraf agreed to step down as army chief by the end of 2004.

Musharraf appeared calm and unharmed in an interview on state-run television about seven hours after the attack, saying the attempt was the work of misguided "extremists."

"I was the target," Musharraf said, clad in a navy blue business suit. "We must fight against them and cleanse the country of these extremists. These are cowardly people, but my resolve is strong and I have total faith in God."

Officials said two suicide attackers driving pickup trucks, each loaded with 44-66 pounds of explosive, detonated as they tried to ram into the president's motorcade as it passed two nearby gas stations on a main road in Rawalpindi, a bustling city near the capital, Islamabad. Eyewitnesses reported seeing body parts, shattered cars and broken glass along the route.

"It was an assassination attempt on the president," said Gen. Shaukat Sultan, the chief army spokesman. "It was a suicide attack."

The attack prompted serious new concern over Musharraf's security. It happened a few hundred yards from where would-be assassins detonated a huge bomb on Dec. 14 that also missed the president narrowly — and just 10 days ahead of a summit of South Asian leaders to be held in Islamabad about 10 miles away.

No suspects have been identified in either attack, but Musharraf has pointed the finger in both cases at Islamic extremists, who have angered by his support for the U.S.-led war on terrorism in neighboring Afghanistan following the Sept. 11 terror attacks. Pakistan had been a key supporter of Afghanistan's hardline Taliban regime.

Abdur Rauf Chaudry, a spokesman for the Interior Ministry, said 14 people were killed in Thursday's bombings, including two policemen and at least two suicide bombers. Some 46 people were injured.

"Thanks be to God, (the president) and members of his convoy are safe," Information Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed said on state television. Ahmed said the windscreen on Musharraf's armored limousine was damaged, and a car at the end of his motorcade was severely damaged, but the president's vehicle continued on its way.

Ahmed said Musharraf had returned to Army House, the heavily-fortified official residence of the army chief in Rawalpindi. Meanwhile, Prime Minister Zafarullah Khan Jamali called an emergency meeting of the Cabinet.

The road where the attack occurred is one used nearly every day by Musharraf as he travels from his residence to his presidential offices. Rawalpindi is home to the army headquarters and until recently was regarded as one of the most secure cities in the country.

"It appears that an organized group is chasing the president. The security system has absolutely collapsed," ruling party Sen. Syed Mushahid Hussain told the private GEO television network. He said the six South Asian leaders — including the prime minister of Pakistan's archrival India — due to attend the Jan. 4-6 summit in Islamabad "might reconsider their plans to come here."

Shortly after the attack, frantic family members of those killed and injured gathered outside nearby Rawalpindi Central Hospital, many in tears.

"I saw three people very badly injured," said Sajid Bashir, 25, an employee at one of the gas stations where the attack occurred. "It was chaos."

Another man, who identified himself only as Iqbal and said he was a friend of one of the dead police officers, blasted Musharraf's government for creating the conditions for the attack.

"This military rule created the terrorists and they are facing the consequences now," he told The Associated Press at the hospital entrance which was stained with the blood of casualties.

"A lot of the people who were hurt and killed in this bombing were just walking on the street. They don't care about politics."

Musharraf has been targeted in at least three suicide attacks since he took power in a bloodless coup in 1999, the first one in April 2002 in the southern city of Karachi when a bomb failed to detonate as his motorcade passed. Three Islamic militants were sentenced to 10 years in prison for that plot.

In the Dec. 14 attack in Rawalpindi, Musharraf was apparently saved by high-tech jamming devices in his motorcade that delayed the detonation long enough for him to pass by safely. Islamic militant groups were suspected, though no major arrests have been made. Officials have speculated that al Qaeda might also have had a hand in the attack, which used a sophisticated bomb hidden in five places on a bridge.

The latest attack came a day after Musharraf agreed to step-down as army chief by the end of 2004, ending a political stalemate that had paralyzed parliament and stalled this nation's return to democracy.

Under the agreement reached with a coalition of hardline Islamic parties, Musharraf would remain as president but give up the army post. Musharraf also agreed to scale back several extraordinary powers he had decreed himself after taking power.

By Matthew Pennington