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'Shoot anyone disrupting polls'
15/01/2008 11:34 - (SA)
Islamabad - Pakistan's largest city went on high alert on Tuesday after the country's second deadly bombing in under a week, and the US-allied president said he ordered troops to shoot anyone trying to disrupt next month's elections.
Western nations hope the February 18 parliamentary polls will help bring stability to the nuclear-armed country as it battles rising attacks by al-Qaeda and Taliban militants. President Pervez Musharraf, who seized power in a military coup eight years ago, is facing increasingly potent challenges to his rule.
A spasm of violence on Monday underscored those challenges. Troops and militants clashed near the Afghan border, leaving 30 dead. Separately, a bomb killed at least nine people and wounded 52 on Monday in Pakistan's largest city, Karachi.
Arif Ahmed Khan, a top government official in the city, said forensic evidence has been collected from the scene of the bombing outside a textile factory, but "it was too early to say who was behind it or give any motive".
Troops patrolled the streets of the city, which was placed on high alert, he said.
Musharraf said the polls would not be delayed again and expressed confidence they would be peaceful.
"I have said to the rangers and army shoot anyone who tries to do anything of this sort (disrupting the polls)," he said.
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