Amanda Hodge, South Asia correspondent and Peter Kogoy | March 04
PAKISTANI President Asif Ali Zardari has strongly condemned yesterday's terrorist attack on the Sri Lankan cricket team in Lahore, as authorities scramble to find the gunmen responsible.
The suspected Islamic terrorists opened a new front by launching an attack on the cricket squad’s bus, wounding eight team members and killing at least eight people, six of them police
It had plunged Pakistan into a "state of war," Rehman Malik, the Prime Minister's interior adviser, said. "Be patient, we will flush all these terrorists out of the country.”
The attack, in Pakistan's most cosmopolitan city, bore all the hallmarks of the terror group responsible for November's deadly Mumbai attacks.
Punjabi Governor Salman Tahseer said the 12 masked and heavily armed gunmen who attacked the cricket convoy as it approached the Gaddafi stadium were not ordinary terrorists, but highly trained.
While last night no group had claimed responsibility for the attack, Mr Tahseer said the terrorists appeared to follow the same modus operandi as the Mumbai gunmen, who have been linked to the Pakistani Islamic terror group Lashkar-e-Toiba.
"I want to say it's the same pattern, the same terrorists who attacked Mumbai," Mr Tahseer said.
The terrorists, travelling by rickshaw and taxi and armed with Kalashnikov rifles, rocket launchers and grenades, attacked the Sri Lankan team's bus about 9am (3pm AEDT) as it headed into the stadium for the third day of the final Test match of the series.
All 12 terrorists managed to escape, but four armed suspects were arrested late yesterday by police after a manhunt was launched in the city. Lahore police also defused two car bombs yesterday and found a stash of weapons in the city.
"The plan was apparently to kill the Sri Lankan team but the police came in the way and forced the attackers to run away," police chief Habib-ur Rehman said.
Sri Lanka's captain Mahela Jayawardene, who received minor shrapnel wounds in the attack, said officials and players dropped to the floor as one of the attackers fired a rocket launcher at the bus. It missed its target.
"The gunmen targeted the wheels of the bus first, and then the bus. We all dived to the floor to take cover," Jayawardene said.
As well as opening fire on the bus, the terrorists lobbed grenades before engaging in a 25-minute shootout with police. TV footage showed gunmen, carrying backpacks, firing at the convoy. A police official said two civilians and six policemen guarding the players were killed in the attack.
Vice-captain Kumar Sangakkara, who had shrapnel removed from his shoulder, said last night the entire touring squad was safe.
"There are a few injuries, but everyone is safe and all the players are out of danger," Sangakkara told the Indian news channel CNN-IBN from Lahore.
"We are shocked, but apart from that everyone is OK.
"It's very unfortunate that this has happened. I don't regret coming here to play cricket because that's what we have been doing all our lives.
"That is our profession. But all we want to do now is to go back home to our families, get back home and be safe."
Mr Zardari strongly condemned the violence and ordered an inquiry, while Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse called the incident a “cowardly terrorist attack”.
US President Barack Obama said he was “deeply concerned” about the latest violence to hit Washington's “war on terror” ally, while British Foreign Secretary David Miliband condemned the incident “unreservedly”.
The Pakistan Cricket Board said the attack was “beyond (its) control,” adding that it was “deeply shocked” by the incident.
Despite heightened security for the visiting team, the bus was not bulletproof and the route to the stadium was open to traffic.
As well as Jayawardene and Sangakkara, five other players were wounded, including opening batsmen Tharanga Paranavitana and Thilan Samaraweera.
Paranavitana had shrapnel removed from his chest and Samaraweera -- who this week became only the seventh batsmen to notch a double hundred in consecutive tests -- was operated on for a gunshot wound to the thigh.
Also wounded were Ajantha Mendis (shrapnel in neck and scalp), Suranka Lakmal and Chaminda Vaas. British assistant coach Paul Farbrace was also wounded. Australian-born head coach Trevor Bayliss was unhurt.
Two Pakistani air force helicopters evacuated the Sri Lankan team from the stadium to an air base, from where they were to be flown home by charter aircraft.
Sixteen members of the touring party ran towards the military aircraft on the pitch under the guard of security officials.
Samaraweera and Paranavitana were carried on stretchers to a helicopter that also evacuated from the stadium Jayawardene and manager Brenden Kurrupu.
Mr Bayliss's wife, Julie, told The Australian her husband was lucky to have escaped the attack.
"Trevor's OK, thank God, but they took an inch and a half of shrapnel from the back of Paul Farbrace's head," she said.
"Trev told me there was a lot of blood on the team bus from the injuries suffered by the other blokes on the team."
Sydney-born Pakistan cricket team trainer David Dwyer, who was travelling in another bus in the convoy, described hearing a noise like firecrackers going off before his bus came to a screeching halt.
There seemed to be a lot of confusion and panic around the Sri Lankan team bus, which was "behind us when we passed it on the road", Dwyer said.
"It was only when we got back to the hotel and were told to stay in our rooms that we were told what had happened," he said. "Right now I'm still trying to get my head around what had just happened to a lot of our mates on the Sri Lankan cricket team."
Security concerns have plagued Pakistan for years and some foreign sports teams, including the Australian cricket team, have refused to play there. Just last month, after the Mumbai attack in which more than 170 people were killed, the Indian Government refused permission for the national cricket team to tour Pakistan.
Yesterday's attack was the first time a sporting team had been targeted in the nuclear-armed South Asian nation, which appears to be losing its battle to contain Islamic extremists within its borders.
It also rocked the South Asian heartland of cricket and prompted an immediate review of arrangements for the 2011 World Cup. The showpiece tournament is due to be jointly hosted by India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh.
"Quite clearly, this event puts a great question mark over the ability of Pakistan to host cricket World Cup matches," International Cricket Council president David Morgan told the BBC.
The Sri Lankan military is also engaged in a bloody battle with Tamil separatists in the north of the country. But Sri Lanka military spokesman Udaya Nanayakkara said he did not believe the attack was carried out by Tamil Tiger rebels, who are now on the brink of defeat after a 25-year armed struggle for a separate Tamil nation.
Reg Dickason, a security expert for the Australian, English and New Zealand cricket teams who opposed the Champion's Trophy being played in Pakistan last year, said yesterday he had tried to dissuade the Sri Lankan team from touring Pakistan a fortnight before their scheduled visit.
"Pakistan is in a volatile situation and travelling there needed careful consideration," he said.
PAKISTANI President Asif Ali Zardari has strongly condemned yesterday's terrorist attack on the Sri Lankan cricket team in Lahore, as authorities scramble to find the gunmen responsible.
The suspected Islamic terrorists opened a new front by launching an attack on the cricket squad’s bus, wounding eight team members and killing at least eight people, six of them police
It had plunged Pakistan into a "state of war," Rehman Malik, the Prime Minister's interior adviser, said. "Be patient, we will flush all these terrorists out of the country.”
The attack, in Pakistan's most cosmopolitan city, bore all the hallmarks of the terror group responsible for November's deadly Mumbai attacks.
Punjabi Governor Salman Tahseer said the 12 masked and heavily armed gunmen who attacked the cricket convoy as it approached the Gaddafi stadium were not ordinary terrorists, but highly trained.
While last night no group had claimed responsibility for the attack, Mr Tahseer said the terrorists appeared to follow the same modus operandi as the Mumbai gunmen, who have been linked to the Pakistani Islamic terror group Lashkar-e-Toiba.
"I want to say it's the same pattern, the same terrorists who attacked Mumbai," Mr Tahseer said.
The terrorists, travelling by rickshaw and taxi and armed with Kalashnikov rifles, rocket launchers and grenades, attacked the Sri Lankan team's bus about 9am (3pm AEDT) as it headed into the stadium for the third day of the final Test match of the series.
All 12 terrorists managed to escape, but four armed suspects were arrested late yesterday by police after a manhunt was launched in the city. Lahore police also defused two car bombs yesterday and found a stash of weapons in the city.
"The plan was apparently to kill the Sri Lankan team but the police came in the way and forced the attackers to run away," police chief Habib-ur Rehman said.
Sri Lanka's captain Mahela Jayawardene, who received minor shrapnel wounds in the attack, said officials and players dropped to the floor as one of the attackers fired a rocket launcher at the bus. It missed its target.
"The gunmen targeted the wheels of the bus first, and then the bus. We all dived to the floor to take cover," Jayawardene said.
As well as opening fire on the bus, the terrorists lobbed grenades before engaging in a 25-minute shootout with police. TV footage showed gunmen, carrying backpacks, firing at the convoy. A police official said two civilians and six policemen guarding the players were killed in the attack.
Vice-captain Kumar Sangakkara, who had shrapnel removed from his shoulder, said last night the entire touring squad was safe.
"There are a few injuries, but everyone is safe and all the players are out of danger," Sangakkara told the Indian news channel CNN-IBN from Lahore.
"We are shocked, but apart from that everyone is OK.
"It's very unfortunate that this has happened. I don't regret coming here to play cricket because that's what we have been doing all our lives.
"That is our profession. But all we want to do now is to go back home to our families, get back home and be safe."
Mr Zardari strongly condemned the violence and ordered an inquiry, while Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse called the incident a “cowardly terrorist attack”.
US President Barack Obama said he was “deeply concerned” about the latest violence to hit Washington's “war on terror” ally, while British Foreign Secretary David Miliband condemned the incident “unreservedly”.
The Pakistan Cricket Board said the attack was “beyond (its) control,” adding that it was “deeply shocked” by the incident.
Despite heightened security for the visiting team, the bus was not bulletproof and the route to the stadium was open to traffic.
As well as Jayawardene and Sangakkara, five other players were wounded, including opening batsmen Tharanga Paranavitana and Thilan Samaraweera.
Paranavitana had shrapnel removed from his chest and Samaraweera -- who this week became only the seventh batsmen to notch a double hundred in consecutive tests -- was operated on for a gunshot wound to the thigh.
Also wounded were Ajantha Mendis (shrapnel in neck and scalp), Suranka Lakmal and Chaminda Vaas. British assistant coach Paul Farbrace was also wounded. Australian-born head coach Trevor Bayliss was unhurt.
Two Pakistani air force helicopters evacuated the Sri Lankan team from the stadium to an air base, from where they were to be flown home by charter aircraft.
Sixteen members of the touring party ran towards the military aircraft on the pitch under the guard of security officials.
Samaraweera and Paranavitana were carried on stretchers to a helicopter that also evacuated from the stadium Jayawardene and manager Brenden Kurrupu.
Mr Bayliss's wife, Julie, told The Australian her husband was lucky to have escaped the attack.
"Trevor's OK, thank God, but they took an inch and a half of shrapnel from the back of Paul Farbrace's head," she said.
"Trev told me there was a lot of blood on the team bus from the injuries suffered by the other blokes on the team."
Sydney-born Pakistan cricket team trainer David Dwyer, who was travelling in another bus in the convoy, described hearing a noise like firecrackers going off before his bus came to a screeching halt.
There seemed to be a lot of confusion and panic around the Sri Lankan team bus, which was "behind us when we passed it on the road", Dwyer said.
"It was only when we got back to the hotel and were told to stay in our rooms that we were told what had happened," he said. "Right now I'm still trying to get my head around what had just happened to a lot of our mates on the Sri Lankan cricket team."
Security concerns have plagued Pakistan for years and some foreign sports teams, including the Australian cricket team, have refused to play there. Just last month, after the Mumbai attack in which more than 170 people were killed, the Indian Government refused permission for the national cricket team to tour Pakistan.
Yesterday's attack was the first time a sporting team had been targeted in the nuclear-armed South Asian nation, which appears to be losing its battle to contain Islamic extremists within its borders.
It also rocked the South Asian heartland of cricket and prompted an immediate review of arrangements for the 2011 World Cup. The showpiece tournament is due to be jointly hosted by India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh.
"Quite clearly, this event puts a great question mark over the ability of Pakistan to host cricket World Cup matches," International Cricket Council president David Morgan told the BBC.
The Sri Lankan military is also engaged in a bloody battle with Tamil separatists in the north of the country. But Sri Lanka military spokesman Udaya Nanayakkara said he did not believe the attack was carried out by Tamil Tiger rebels, who are now on the brink of defeat after a 25-year armed struggle for a separate Tamil nation.
Reg Dickason, a security expert for the Australian, English and New Zealand cricket teams who opposed the Champion's Trophy being played in Pakistan last year, said yesterday he had tried to dissuade the Sri Lankan team from touring Pakistan a fortnight before their scheduled visit.
"Pakistan is in a volatile situation and travelling there needed careful consideration," he said.
Source: The Australian
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