“Violence in Pakistan has spread well beyond the dangerous Afghan border region.” The government has set the disastrous precedent of imposing sharia law to stop it, and the jihadists are pressing the advantage.
“Suicide bomber kills 22 in Pakistan Shiite mosque,” by Zarar Khan for the Associated Press, April 5:
ISLAMABAD — A suicide bomber attacked a crowded Shiite mosque south of the Pakistani capital on Sunday, killing 22 people and wounding dozens more in the latest carnage to hit the U.S.-allied nation, officials said.
Violence in Pakistan has spread well beyond the dangerous Afghan border region, including a suicide bombing in Islamabad on Saturday that killed eight paramilitary personnel and a deadly commando-style attack against a police academy last week in Lahore.
Fedayeen al-Islam, a little-known group believed linked to the Taliban, claimed responsibility through a spokesman. Pakistan also has a history of sectarian violence that often involves attacks by Sunni extremists on minority Shiites.
Separately, a senior Pakistan Taliban commander claimed responsibility for Saturday’s attack on the paramilitary forces, saying it was in retaliation for U.S. drone missile strikes against militants in Pakistan near the Afghan border and threatening to carry out two suicide attacks per week. The group has also said it carried out the attack in Lahore.
Sunday’s suicide bomber set off his explosives at the entrance to a mosque in Chakwal city in Punjab province, about 50 miles (80 kilometers) south of Islamabad, during a religious congregation, said Nadim Hasan Asif, a top security official in Punjab. He said the blast killed 22 people and injured more than 30….