A suicide car-bomber killed four people today near a Pakistan air force base close to the northwestern city of Peshawar and the Afghan border, a government official said.
The attacker set off his bomb after being challenged at a checkpost near a police station about 2km from the Badaber air base on the city's outskirts. The explosion badly damaged the police station, a mosque and a shop.
Four people were killed and 24 wounded, said an administrator at the Peshawar's main hospital.
The bomber was driving a small van of a type often used as a delivery vehicle and police opened fire on him when he refused to stop for a check, said Peshawar police chief Liaquat Ali Khan.
The van was coming from the direction of the Khyber ethic Pashtun tribal region where Taliban militants have been fighting security forces.
Peshawar has been targeted several times since the army began an offensive against the Taliban in South Waziristan last month and militants stepped up retaliatory attacks. Hundreds of people have been killed.
The army went on the offensive in South Waziristan on the Afghan border on October 17th, aiming to root out Pakistani Taliban militants who stepped up their war on security forces in 2007. The militants have responded with intensified attacks in towns and cities across the country.
Reuters
