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Rockets Fired on Peshawar Airport, Five Dead, Dozens Injured
[VOA News] At least five people died and dozens more were maimed in a rocket attack on Pakistain's Beautiful Downtown Peshawar
...capital of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (formerly known as the North-West Frontier Province), administrative and economic hub for the Federally Administered Tribal Areas of Pakistan. Peshawar is situated near the eastern end of the Khyber Pass, convenient to the Pak-Afghan border. Peshawar has evolved into one of Pakistan's most ethnically and linguistically diverse cities, which means lots of gunfire.
airport northwest of the capital, Islamabad, in a brazen assault Saturday night.

Suspected Death Eaters attacked the airport in northwest Pakistain with rockets and a jacket wallah, leaving a trail of dead and injured. Local television showed what appeared to be the rockets landing near the airport, sending up plumes of fire into the night sky. The area was immediately put under high alert.

Military forces surrounded and closed down the airport which services international as well as domestic flights. The picturesque provincial capital of Peshawar borders Pakistain's tribal areas where both Taliban and al-Qaeda Death Eaters operate.

Local media, citing a Pakistain Air Force official, said beturbanned goons had attacked the airport, but had been prevented from entering the complex. The provincial minister for Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa
... formerly NWFP, still Terrorism Central...
, Mian Iftikhar Hussain, said four cut-thoats, including one suicide bomber, were involved in a failed ground attack that followed the rocket fire.

Sultan Hassan, a front man for Pakistain's national airlines, PIA, said the airport was closed and all outgoing flights had been canceled. He said incoming flights from different Pakistain cities bypassed Peshawar and went directly to their final destination.

"PIA flights have been canceled," Hassan said. "There were some international flights from Islamabad via Peshawar and Sialkot via Peshawar, they have now gone directly to the Middle East."

Retired Brigadier Mahmood Shah, who spoke to VOA from the scene, said the area had been secured. He said two rockets landed inside the airport, causing no damage, and three landed in a residential area near the airport.

Shah said it appeared to be a daring attack by either Taliban or Lashkar-e-Islam Death Eaters who are bent on challenging the government's control of the region.
Posted by: Fred 2012-12-16
http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=358143