Cantt Station bombing: CCTV footage suggests it was suicide attack

The footage shows the explosion goes off as a mustached man bends to his side and raises left arm.

KARACHI: Footage from closed-circuit television (CCTV) cameras suggest that Saturday’s mysterious blast outside Cantt railway station was in fact a suicide attack, The Express Tribune learnt on Sunday.

Six people were killed and over 50 wounded when the blast ripped through an inter-city passenger bus. Police officials kept guessing about the nature of the blast as, according to them, no traces of explosives were found at the site.

On Sunday, investigators reviewed the footage from the CCTV cameras installed in the Cantt station neighbourhood which suggested that it was a suicide attack, a senior police investigator told The Express Tribune.



The footage shows a bulky man, clad in shalwar-kameez and jacket, standing near the Sargodha-bound bus and then moving forward when the driver boards the vehicle, he added. “As soon as the bus left the terminal, the man bent to his side, raised his left hand and the explosion went off.”

Another investigator told The Express Tribune that the suspected bomber had a moustache but no beard. “He [the suspected bomber] was 5.5 feet tall. One could guess from his facial expressions that he was carrying something heavy,” explained the investigator.

Police investigators had found some human limbs at the site on Saturday. Now, they have started searching for other body parts of the suspected bomber.

“The footage confirms that the suicide bomber wanted to target the bus,” a senior officer of the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) told The Express Tribune. “However, it is still not clear why the bus was targeted,” he added.

A senior officer of Saddar police said that they were trying to identify the suspected bomber and ascertain the motives. He added that the bus owner and manager of the booking office would also be questioned.

“The booking office is said to be owned by a senior military officer,” he said. “We are investigating it from various angles: It could be the result of some business rivalry, it could be harassment, or it could be a message to the military,” he added.

The blast took place hardly 500 metres from the Army House where army chief Gen Ashfaq Parvez Kayani had lunch hours, before the explosion.

Saqib Sultan, the superintendent of police for Saddar division, neither confirmed nor denied it was a suicide blast. He claimed a “breakthrough in investigation” but refused to share details with the media.

The Frere police registered (FIR No 149/12) 30 hours after the blast against unidentified persons on behalf of the state. In the case, the police also invoked Section ¾ of the Explosives Act and 7 of the Anti-Terrorism Act.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 31^st, 2012.