LAHORE, Pakistan — Two powerful suicide bomb blasts at Pakistan’s Navy War College killed at least four people and injured 16 Tuesday in the fifth consecutive day of major attacks by pro-Taliban militants in Pakistan.
The early-afternoon assault in the heart of the country’s cultural capital was the second against high-profile military targets in Pakistan in a week, marking a significant setback to pledges by the beleaguered government of President Pervez Musharraf to improve security.
The attack sparked panic across Lahore, which has until recently remained relatively insulated from the violence roiling the rest of the country.
The first blast occurred when a man wearing a vest packed with explosives walked up to the main gate of the navy college.
“Our security men saw the bomber, but he blew himself up as soon as he was stopped at the gate,” said Capt. Akbar Naqi, a spokesman for the Pakistani navy.
A second man approached the gate on a motorcycle moments later and detonated his bomb in the parking lot. The impact of that blast set off a chain reaction of explosions as several vehicles fueled by natural gas went up in a wall of flames.
Mohammed Safder, 23, a driver for an officer in the Pakistani air force, said he had just stopped to eat at the college cafeteria when he heard the first blast. When he went outside, he saw dozens of people scattered in the parking lot crying for help. Seconds later, another bomb went off.
“I’ve never been so scared in my life,” Safder said. “People were running and screaming, and there were body parts everywhere.”
Pakistani officials gave conflicting accounts of the number of casualties, with military officials saying at least three were killed and 16 injured. Ambulances rushed the wounded and the bodies of the dead to two military hospitals.
A state of emergency was briefly declared at four local hospitals within hours of the blasts as medical workers braced for the possibility of more casualties. Local authorities immediately ordered the closure of educational institutions across the city.
Dozens of army, navy and police personnel cordoned off the area around the block-long campus of the military college. The college trains hundreds of Pakistani navy officers and officers from several other countries, including China, Egypt and Saudia Arabia.
The naval college is less than a mile from the American consulate in Lahore. The area surrounding the college is home to several residences for high-ranking military and politicians and is close to several other elite educational institutions.
Attacks by pro-Taliban extremists have been on the rise since January, with the violence intensifying sharply as voters went to the polls in the country’s national parliamentary elections on Feb. 18. At least 174 people have been killed and scores injured in eight bomb attacks within the past month.
