In an apparent retaliation to the deadly army strike on a religious seminary in Bajaur tribal area, a suicide bomber detonated himself on Wednesday in a army training camp in Pakistan's northwest, killing 35 soldiers and injuring over 40.
A man wrapped in a shawl came running into the training area at Dargai near Mardan in the province and blew himself up where recruits had gathered for training, the army said in a statement.
Witnesses said the attack happened when the soldiers were exercising in the ground of the military fort.
An organisation called 'Pakistan Taliban' claimed it carried out the bomb attack as a revenge for last week's military attack on a madrassa in Bajaur tribal agency.
Interior Minister Aftab Khan Sherpao in his report to President Pervez Mushrraf has stated that the suicide attack was believed to be the fallout of the attack on madrassa.
Musharraf said the attack would not deter the government from continuing its efforts to combat terrorism.
"The culprits can not escape the law," he said and directed intelligence agencies to step up operations to prevent such attacks.
Geo TV reported that hours after the attack, its correspondent in Peshawar received a telephone call from an unidentified person claiming the attack was carried out by 'Pakistan Taliban' in retaliation for last Monday's Bajaur madrassa attack in which 80 suspected militant undergoing training were killed.
The caller reportedly said that previously their policy was not to attack the Pakistan army but the group has changed its stance after the attack on madrasa.
He also stated that the group has over 275 bombers who would carry out such attacks in future.
The caller, who spoke in Pushto, said the suicide bomber who carried out the attack made a speech in a video recording which would be sent later.
Dargai is a stronghold of a banned pro-Taleban movement, Tehreek-e-Nifaz-e-Shariat-Mohammadi. It led thousands of tribesmen across the border into Afghanistan to fight American forces after the US-led invasion of Afghanistan in 2001.
Media reports said that one of the accomplices of the bomber, whose identity has not yet been established, was apprehended.
Earlier, Sherpao told reporters that the government believed that the incident was linked with an air strike on a religious school in the tribal region of Bajaur.
Action against the madrasa was taken after government received intelligence reports that suicide bombers with specific missions were being trained at the Bajaur tribal agency.
Sherpao said this was the precise reason why army had to attack the madrassa to prevent them from carrying out their missions.
The government has already released infra red video footage of large number of persons conducting physical exercises in the madrasa located close to Afghan border.
He said no arrests were made so far and the injured were being rushed to various hospitals.
"We have gathered intelligence reports which link the suicide attack with the air strike. If the air strike in Bajaur was not carried out, more would-be suicide bombers would get training of suicide bombing," he said.
"We will undertake action wherever we find such militant activity. Terrorism is a threat to our national security which will be combated and crushed at all costs," Sherpao said.
Without directly naming Islamic parties that whipped up a campaign against the government, he said, "Given the complexity of the issues, various parties try to exploit it for petty vested interests and create gross misperceptions amongst the general public."
He said extreme care is being exercised to ensure that there is no loss of innocent lives or collateral damage while combating terrorists.
"This was also ensured in case of the recent Bajaur incident where we had evidence that militants were being trained. There were also intelligence reports about active involvement of these militant leaders in terrorist activities," he said.
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