Taliban claims attack on Karachi airport

The Pakistani Taliban has claimed responsibility for a brazen attack on the country’s busiest civilian airport by a squad of 10 heavily armed gunmen, which is likely to dash hopes of a peace deal with the militant group.

On Sunday night, Jinnah International Airport in Karachi reverberated with the sound of gunfire and explosions as television showed a fire blazing not far from where aircraft were parked on the ground.

The operation to clear the airport raged for six hours until dawn, with 28 people reported killed, including all of the attackers, who had entered the airport wearing uniforms of the Airport’s Security Force, apparently preparing for a long siege.

An army spokesman declared the armed response a success, saying the militants “were confined to two areas and eliminated”. The attack leaves the government’s year-long effort to use the prospect of peace talks to avoid a military confrontation with the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) in tatters.

Revenge attack

TTP spokesman Shahidullah Shahid said the talks had been a sham and the attack was revenge for the killing of Hakimullah Mehsud in November. The former TTP chief was killed by a CIA drone strike on November 1st. “Pakistan used peace talks as a tool of war, it killed hundreds of innocent tribal women and children. This is our first attack to avenge the death of Hakimullah Mehsud,” he told Agence France-Presse.

“We have yet to take revenge for the deaths of hundreds of innocent tribal women and children in Pakistani air strikes. It’s just the beginning. We have taken revenge for one. We have to take revenge for hundreds.”

In recent weeks, the army has launched what it described as retaliatory air strikes and limited ground operations in north Waziristan, a tribal “agency” bordering Afghanistan that serves as an important sanctuary for the TTP.

The government had doggedly pressed on with peace talk efforts despite earlier attacks, even as government and TTP intermediaries began holding discussions earlier in the year. But the six-hour assault on the airport of Pakistan’s economic hub is one of the most serious the country has suffered for years.

It could provide the prime minister, Nawaz Sharif, the political space he needs to back army demands for military operations in north Waziristan, a policy bitterly opposed by right-wing opposition parties, particularly Imran Khan's Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI).

Twin teams

The attack began shortly before midnight – a busy time for both domestic and international flights – when 10 men armed with assault rifles and rocket-propelled grenades fought their way through two entrances to the airport. One team stormed a small terminal used for VIPs, including the prime minister and foreign dignitaries, while the other appeared to enter through a gate used for accessing a maintenance area. Security officials speculated that the group, which reportedly included suicide bombers, had hoped to hijack a plane but became pinned down before they were able to reach any airliners.

The dead included eight airport security members, two officials from the paramilitary Rangers, one police officer and three staff from state carrier Pakistan International Airlines.

Broken glass and spent gun magazines littered the engineering section where the first exchange of gunfire took place as smoke from grenade attacks began to die down. “I heard fierce firing and then saw the terrorists firing at security force . . . Thank God I am alive, this is very scary,” said airport employee Sarmad Hussain.

The attack is an embarrassing blow to the government on several levels. It will once again highlight concerns that the country is unable to protect extremely sensitive targets from militant groups fighting against the Pakistani state.

The attack comes just three years after the Mehran naval airbase, three miles from the airport, suffered a similar attack when a team of militants killed 10 military personnel and destroyed two aircraft. The group also carried out a raid on Pakistan’s military headquarters in the garrison city of Rawalpindi in 2009, leaving 23 dead including 11 troops and three hostages.

Security measures at the airport have been criticised in the past. The road passing through the outer perimeter of the main terminal is guarded by security forces armed with dowsing rods.

The attack could also deal a huge blow to business confidence, which had begun to perk up following the election of industrialist Nawaz Sharif as prime minister. Sharif’s faction of the Pakistan Muslim League is anxious to attract foreign investors back to Pakistan, many of whom were scared away from the country by a sharp deterioration in internal security.

Karachi, the home of key industries including finance, is particularly important for the economic growth he vowed to deliver. Sharif has long wanted to attract foreign airlines back to Pakistan, including British Airways, which cut its services following terrorist attacks.– (Guardian service)