ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — A suicide bomber bearing a box of sweets managed to penetrate one of the most heavily secured police enclaves in the capital Thursday, wrecking a residential building that housed anti-terrorism police and injuring half a dozen officers.
Elsewhere in the country, 10 people were killed when a roadside bomb, apparently planted by insurgents, hit a police bus transporting prisoners, and airstrikes by suspected U.S. unmanned aircraft killed at least nine people near the Afghan border.
By the standard of recent attacks in Pakistani cities and towns, the toll in the bombing of the police barracks in Islamabad was light: The bomber was the only fatality. But the bold strike against such a well-fortified target was seen as an emphatic show of defiance by Islamic militants.
The box of sweets, delivered just before the blast was set off, contained a note demanding an end to military offensives in the tribal lands along the Afghan border where al-Qaeda and Taliban militants have found sanctuary, intelligence officials said. The note was written in Pashtu, the language spoken in the tribal areas.
Thursday’s roadside bombing took place in the Dir region, not far from the tribal areas.
Like many such attacks aimed at the police and military, Thursday’s claimed civilian lives as well. Four children passing at the time of the blast were killed, together with two police officers and four prisoners aboard the bus. Ten other people were injured.
The U.S. attacks are extremely unpopular among Pakistanis, who generally believe that they, in combination with offensives by the Pakistani army, have galvanized militants to carry out more suicide bombings against civilian targets.
