Pakistan attacks: police buildings in Lahore targeted by gunmen

Initial reports said that some of the terrorists involved were women.

Gunmen attacked a police academy, an Elite commando training centre and the Federation Investigation Agency. Counter-terrorist operations were underway, with troops storming the FIA and the police academy at Munawanerrorists claimed another ten victims when a suicide bomber drove his car into a police station in Kohat, a military garrison town in the North West frontier Province, 115 miles west of the capital Islamabad.

These latest attacks came just days after a Taliban commando raid on the Pakistan Army’s Rawalpindi headquarters left 19 dead as its leaders sought to intensify pressure on Islamabad to abandon a planned offensive against terrorist bases in South Waziristan.

The Lahore attacks started simultaneously at around 9.15am. At 11am, the siege at the FIA building in the centre of Lahore was apparently over, where seven dead were reported. By 11.30am officials were claiming that the Munawan attack was over, with reports of up to five police personnel dead, and 8 to 10 injured. Some of the attackers blew themselves up.

An exchange of fire was still underway at the Elite facility, which lies on the outskirts of the city close to the airport. Loud explosions were heard and it was reported that three police officers had died there.

Sajjad Bhutta, a senior local government official in Lahore, said the site at the Elite centre was "critical".

The Munawan police academy came under a similar attack in March this year, while the FIA building was largely destroyed by a massive bombing last year.

Pakistani extremists have combined their suicide bombing tactics with "fidayeen" military-style gun assaults.

Lahore is the main city of the heartland Punjab province. The city is a historic centre that is considered the cultural capital of Pakistan.

There have now been terrorist attacks in Pakistan on five days since Monday last week. The surge in bloody strikes appears timed for the imminent army offensive planned for Waziristan, in the trial area, the epicentre of Pakistani extremism.