PAKISTAN: A suicide bomber killed an American diplomat and three other people in the port city of Karachi yesterday on the eve of President Bush's first visit to Pakistan.
The blast tore through the rear car park of the Marriott hotel, 20 metres from the US consulate, wounding 52 people, propelling vehicles into the air and showering the streets with debris.
The diplomat, his driver and a Pakistani soldier who apparently tried to prevent the bomber reaching the consulate were killed immediately. An unidentified woman also perished.
Mr Bush vowed to press ahead with his trip, the final leg of his tour of south Asia, saying he would not be deterred by "terrorists and killers".
"We have lost at least one US citizen in the bombing, a foreign service officer, and I send our country's deepest condolences to that person's loved ones and family," he said while in neighbouring India."Terrorists and killers are not going to prevent me from going to Pakistan."
Security experts said the bombing was one of the largest ever in Karachi, a hotbed of Islamic militancy that has seen several suicide attacks since 2001.
Security cameras showed a man jumping into a car and ramming it into the vehicle of the American diplomat, named by Pakistani officials as David Foy.
The blast shattered windows on all 10 of the hotel's floors and flung wreckage as far as 200m. The remains of one victim landed on the second floor. A Moroccan girl was among the wounded.
Street vendor Muhammad Ali said the explosion was followed by a second blast, which police believe was caused by a car fuel tank. "I thought the explosions would burst my ear drums," he told one news agency.
One US official said Mr Foy was in charge of maintenance at the consulate, which has been heavily guarded since a 2002 car-bomb attack that killed 15 Pakistanis.
A statement from Pakistan's foreign ministry expressed sadness over the diplomat's death and said the bombing was a "senseless act" that "fortifies our resolve to fight terrorism".
President Bush is due in Islamabad, 1,000 miles to the north, for talks with President Pervez Musharraf tomorrow, although officials say he may land this evening.
The visit is intended as a show of solidarity with a key ally in the war on al-Qaeda and Islamic militancy. But it is deeply unpopular among Pakistanis who oppose US policy in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Anti-US sentiment was inflamed in January by the bombing of a tribal village that missed its target, al-Qaeda number two Ayman al-Zawahiri, but killed 13 villagers.
Ali Dayan Hasan of Human Rights Watch said the bomb was "designed to send a message to President Bush about the political isolation of Gen Musharraf and the fragility of US interests in Pakistan".