Terror Attack Catalogue

Date: October 25th, 2010
Method: Bomb, disguised as milk container
Location: The Baba Farid Shrine in Pakpattan, Pakistan
Death Toll: 6
Injury Toll: 20
Perpetrators: Unconfirmed (Suspected Taliban)

Wire Update reports:

The blast happened shortly before dawn, at around 6.30 a.m. local time, at the eastern gate of the Baba Farid Shrine when two men on a motorcycle dropped off a milk container near the gate. Moments later the container exploded, creating a huge ball of fire.
***
Monday’s blast is the third major attack on a shrine in Pakistan over the past four months. On July 1, at least 40 people were killed and more than 170 others were injured during an attack at the Datta Darbar Shrine in Lahore. Another attack happened at the Abdullah Shah Ghazi Shrine in Karachi, killing 14 people and injuring more than 70 others.

Date: April 26th, 2010
Method: Triple Bombing
Location: Kandahar, Afghanistan
Death Toll: 2
Injury Toll: 2
Perpetrators: Unconfirmed (Suspected Taliban)

CNN reports:

"One remote control bomb on the road was detonated while a police convoy was passing on the road. And the second bomb was set in motorbike, on the same road, and that detonated after the first one," said Zalmai Ayoobi, a spokesman for the Kandahar government.

RTE News reports:

Mr Sherzad said he believed he was the target of the attack, in which two civilians died, although he was not in the convoy at the time.

A third blast took place about two hours later but no one was injured.

Kandahar, which is seen as the key battleground in US-led efforts to reverse an insurgency that has lasted nearly nine years, has been the scene of escalating Taliban violence including similar bombings, assassinations and suicide attacks in recent months.

The UN has ordered its staff in Kandahar to stay indoors due to the rapidly deteriorating security situation in the volatile city.

Date: April 25th, 2010
Method: Poison Gas
Location: Girl School Kunduz, Afghanistan
Death Toll: 0
Injury Toll: 48
Perpetrators: Unconfirmed (Suspected Taliban)

The New York Times reports:

Provincial police chief Abdul Razzaq Yaqubi said about 48 girls and several teachers became ill suddenly and many collapsed after smelling poison gas at the school in the northern city of Kunduz, where there has been an upsurge in insurgent violence.
***
The Taliban banned all education for girls when they ruled Afghanistan from 1996-2001 and it remains a disputed issue in much of Afghanistan.

Date: April 25th, 2010
Method: Suicide Bomber
Location: A bazaar in the Sharjoy District - Zabul Province, Afghanistan
Death Toll: 3-4
Injury Toll: 7
Perpetrators: Unconfirmed (Suspected Taliban)

BBC News reports:

The bomber was reportedly on foot and wearing an explosives-packed vest when he targeted a group of security guards, a provincial government spokesman said.

Zabul has witnessed increased insurgent activity in recent months.

Date: April 23rd, 2010
Method: Beheading
Location: North Waziristan, Pakistan
Death Toll: 5
Injury Toll: 0
Perpetrators: Taliban

CNN reports:

Residents Friday found four beheaded and bullet-riddled bodies with a handwritten note nearby accusing them of spying for the U.S. and the Pakistani military, said Muthar Zeb, the top government official in North Waziristan.

He said residents found the bodies dumped along a road. Zeb said the body of another man accused of spying was found near the town of Mir Ali.

***

North Waziristan is believed to be the operating base of pro-Taliban militant commander Jalaluddin Haqqani and Pakistani Taliban commander Hafiz Gul Bahadar, both of whom are suspected of fomenting the insurgency against U.S. troops across the border in Afghanistan.

The Pakistani army says many Taliban fighters who fled last year's military offensive in another tribal region, South Waziristan, have also taken refuge in North Waziristan.

The Pakistani military has yet to launch an offensive against militants in North Waziristan because it says its troops are spread too thin with at least ten other military offensives in the region.

Date: April 19th, 2010
Method: Explosives loaded on donkey cart
Location: Kandahar, Afghanistan
Death Toll: 3 (children)
Injury Toll: 5
Perpetrators: Unconfirmed (suspected Taliban)

"The explosives were loaded onto a donkey cart under a pile of fodder and was detonated remotely," tribal leader Fazluddin Agha told AFP.
"Three children were all my nephews... They were playing with the donkey cart, they had jumped on it (when it blew up outside his heavily-guarded home)."
Agha ran President Hamid Karzai's campaign during last year's presidential elections.
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The use of animals in insurgent attacks is rare but not unheard of.
***
Taliban-led insurgents regularly deploy crude bombs to attack government, military and civilian targets in their insurgency, now well into its ninth year.

Kandahar is seen as the key battleground to reverse the escalating conflict, which is taking an increasing toll on foreign forces and Afghan civilians alike.

Date: April 18th, 2010
Method: Suicide Bomber, Truck Bomb (Truck loaded w/ 250 kilograms of explosives)
Location: Saddar police station in Kohat, Pakistan
Death Toll: 7
Injury Toll: 26
Perpetrators: Taliban

The Washington Post explains:

Pakistan Taliban claimed responsibility in a telephone call to police in Kohat, police said later.

A militant spokesman had said the attack on the police station was in response to police arrests and the killing of militants, said a police spokesman in Kohat town.

***

After its offensives in Swat, South Waziristan and Bajaur, the military has been attacking militants in other areas, including the Orakzai region, where many of the Islamists who fled the earlier offensives are believed to have taken refuge.

The army says more than 300 militants had been killed in fighting in recent weeks in Orakzai and the Kurram region but there has been no independent confirmation of the deaths.

Date: April 15th, 2010
Method: Car Bomb
Location: Kandahar, Afghanistan
Death Toll: 0
Injury Toll: 8
Perpetrators: Suspected Taliban

The Associated Press reports:

Aghalala, a money changer working the street in front of the hotel, said two men pulled up in the car, parked it, and walked away. Five minutes later the white sedan exploded, said Aghalala, who uses only one name.
***
Kandahar is the main city of Afghanistan's volatile south from which the hardline Taliban Islamic militant movement emerged as a political and military force in the early 1990s. NATO forces are expected to launch a major operation in and around the city this summer in a bid to root out insurgents and turn around the nearly nine-year war. The Taliban has reasserted its presence in large parts of the country from which it had faded following the 2001 U.S. invasion that toppled its regime.

Date: April 12th, 2010
Method: Mortar
Location: Kabul, Afghanistan
Death Toll: 3
Injury Toll: 0
Perpetrators: Taliban

The Associated Press reports:

Three women died when mortars fired by suspected insurgents fell on their homes in an increasingly volatile area just north of the capital Kabul, officials said Tuesday.

The entrenched Taliban insurgency is accused of targeting Afghan civilians to spread fear and undercut the authority of Afghanistan's central government, which remains weak, particularly outside Kabul. Formerly stable areas such as Kapisa have become virtual no-go zones for foreigners and non-governmental organizations.

Date: April 11th, 2010
Method: IED/Roadside Bom
Location: Daman District, Afghanistan
Death Toll: 4 civilians (1 soldier)
Injury Toll: 14
Perpetrators: Suspected Taliban

The Associated Press reports:

A home-made bomb tore through a bus carrying a mine clearance team in southern Afghanistan on Sunday, killing four people and injuring more than a dozen others, officials said.
The improvised explosive device -- the Taliban and other militants' weapon of choice against foreign forces and government targets -- detonated as they drove on a dirt road near Daman district.

Date: April 10th, 2010
Method: Suicide Bomb, Guns, Grenades
Location: Emergency Hospital (Italian NGO) in Lashkar Gah, Afghanistan
Death Toll: N/A Attack Foiled
Injury Toll: N/A Attack Foiled
Perpetrators: Operation was funded by the Afghan Taliban based in Pakistan - As per: Helmand Provincial Governor, Gulab Mangal

The New York Times reports:

Suicide vests and grenades hidden in boxes of medicine were found Saturday in a hospital run by an Italian charity in the capital of Helmand Province, Lashkar Gah, and three Italian citizens were detained along with six Afghans who worked at the hospital, according to the provincial governor and Interior Ministry officials in Kabul.
“Initially, the plan was to carry out two attacks in Lashkar Gah, either in a densely populated area or at a picnic site in the outskirts of the city which would of course inflict heavy casualties,” Mr. Mangal said.
The second attack was to have been carried out while he was visiting the injured who were being treated in the Emergency hospital. Mr. Mangal said he usually visited the wounded after attacks.

The Associated Press reports:

Emergency, which was set up in 1994 in Milan, has had a facility in Lashkar Gah since 2003 and has operated in Afghanistan since 1999, treating 2.5 million people, according to its website.

Date: April 7th, 2010
Method: Bomb
Location: Landi Kotal area of Khyber tribal Region, Pakistan
Death Toll: 1
Injury Toll: 4-8 (unconfirmed)
Perpetrators: Taliban

Associated Press reports a bomb had been planted on a NATO Oil tanker.

Date: April 5th, 2010
Method: Petrol bombs, Rockets
Location: Zakha Khel area of Khyber tribal Region, Pakistan
Death Toll: 0
Injury Toll: 0
Perpetrators: Taliban

The Times of India reports that 8 oil tankers were destroyed. The tankers
supply NATO forces with fuel.

Date: April 5th, 2010
Method: Truck Bomb, Machine Guns, Grenades,(at least) 5 Suicide Bombers - NYT
Location: American Consulate in Peshawar, Pakistan
Death Toll: 6
Injury Toll: 20

Date: April 5th, 2010
Method: Suicide Bombing
Location: Timegara town of Dir District, Pakistan
Death Toll: 53
Injury Toll: 107
Perpetrators: Taliban

The attack occurred at a rally in Timergara. There was approximately 500 people attending the rally.

Al Jazeera reports:

Zahid Khan, a spokesman for the Awami National Party, said that members of his party had been celebrating plans to change the name of North West Frontier Province, where Lower Dir is located, when a suspected suicide bomber detonated his explosives.

See also:

New York Times:

A spokesman for the Pakistani Taliban, Azam Tariq, claimed responsibility for the attack, saying it was in retaliation for Pakistani military operations in the western tribal areas that border Afghanistan, and for American missile strikes in the area that killed dozens of militants over the past several months.

The Lede quotes Taliban Spokesman Azam Tariq:

“We accept the attacks on the American consulate. This is revenge for drone attacks,” Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) spokesman Azam Tariq told AFP by telephone from an undisclosed location. “We have already told you that we have 2,800 to 3,000 fedayeen (suicide bombers). We will carry out more such attacks. We will target any place where there are Americans,” he said.

Adnkronosinternational reports that senator Haji Adeel, senior vice president of the Awami National Party (ANP) suspects Al-Quaeda to be be behind the attack. Sources told Adnkronos International (AKI) that Al-Qaeda also worked with the Taliban in co-ordinating the attack.