Pak India Zone: May 2011 Attack On PNS Mehran Base In Karachi,Pakistan.

“The operation still continues. It is not over yet,” said one security official, eight hours after a group of up to 15 militants stormed the installation with guns and grenades, killing at least five people and blowing up at least three military aircrafts.

Flames and smokes belches out from a Pakistani military air base after an attack by militants in Karachi on May 22, 2011. Militants stormed one of Pakistan's biggest military bases in the country's largest city late May 22, triggering explosions and gunbattles three weeks after the US killing of Osama bin Laden. – Photo by AFPMore than 30 troops entered the PNS Mehran base in the southern city of Karachi as the battle resumed and eight blasts were heard in the space of 30 minutes.

Eleven people were wounded in the attack on one of the country’s most heavily guarded military installations, where jet fuel tanks appeared to have caught fire and exploded.“They were carrying guns, rocket-propelled grenades (RPG) and hand grenades. They hit the aircraft with an RPG,”Navy spokesman Commander Salman Ali said earlier.“They have destroyed three P-3c Orion aircraft,” he added.

The Destroyed three P-3c Orion aircraft,

It was not immediately clear who was behind the raid. But Taliban militants, who have vowed to avenge the killing of Osama bin Laden by US Special Forces, have carried out several attacks since the al Qaeda leaders’ death on May 2.The assault started at approximately 10:30 pm on Sunday.The dead included one sailor, three firefighters and an Army ranger, Yasir said.

The Karachi attack evoked memories of an assault on Pakistan’s army headquarters in the town of Rawalpindi in 2009, and revived concerns that even the most well-guarded installations in the country remain vulnerable to militants.A spokesman said one P-3C Orion, a maritime patrol aircraft, had been destroyed and that intermittent gunfire was continuing.

Pakistan Navy's P-3C Orions Destroyed in Terrorist Attack

Interior Minister Rehman Malik

Interior Minister Rehman Malik said earlier the militants had attacked from the rear of the base. “We have been able to confine them to one building and an operation is underway either to kill or capture them.”He said that terrorists sneaked into the base from three of its boundaries bordering civilian populated areas.

“A building in the premises is still under their occupation from where they are exchanging fire with our soldiers,” he said.

Map; Attack On PNS Mehran Base In Karachi

“The situation is being tackled delicately to secure assets, minimise human losses and defeat the terrorists completely,” Malik said, adding that Al-Qaeda and the Taliban had become a danger to the existence of Pakistan.

“It is not just an attack on a navy establishment, it is an attack on Pakistan,” Malik said, warning that those who sympathise with the Taliban and al Qaeda should realise the gravity of the situation and “join hands with us to save our country”.Malik said the Taliban had vowed to avenge the death of bin Laden by attacking Pakistan’s military and civilian interests.

Media reports said the attackers had made their way in through a sewer line, but that was not confirmed. The military’s goal is to capture as many of the attackers alive as possible, Pakistan television reported.Pakistani military and paramilitary reinforcements poured in after the attack began, with four vehicles carrying about 10 troops each moving into the base.

Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani condemned the attack.“Such a cowardly act of terror could not deter the commitment of the government and people of Pakistan to fight terrorism,” Gilani said in statement.

Wave of Bombings

Attack On PNS Mehran Base In Karachi,Pakistan.

Pakistan has faced a wave of bombings and gun assaults over the last few years, some of them claimed by the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), or Pakistani Taliban.

Others have been blamed on al Qaeda-linked militant groups once nurtured by the Pakistani military which have since slipped out of control.The discovery that bin Laden was living in the garrison town of Abbottabad, not far from the Pakistan Military Academy, has revived suspicions that militants may be receiving help from some people within the security establishment.

Pakistan and the United States say the senior leadership in the country did not know bin Laden was in Abbottabad.Washington sees nuclear-armed Pakistan as a key, if troubled, ally in the region essential to its attempts to root out militant forces in neighbouring Afghanistan.

“We condemn the attack and our sympathies are with the families of those injured or killed,” the White House in Washington said in a statement.

On April 28, suspected militants detonated a roadside bomb in Karachi, killing four members of the navy, the third attack on the navy in a week.The attack came two days after two bombs hit buses carrying navy personnel, killing four people and wounding 56. Taliban insurgents took responsibility for the twin attacks.

TTP claims responsibility for PNS Mehran attack

MIRANSHAH: Therik-e-Taliban Pakistani (TTP) on Monday claimed responsibility for an attack on PNS Mehran in Karachi that killed five military personnel and threatened further attacks.

“We claim responsibility for this attack in Karachi,” Taliban spokesman Ehsanullah Ehsan told foreign news agency by telephone from an undisclosed location.“We had already warned after Osama’s (bin Laden) martyrdom that we will carry out even bigger attacks,” he added. (AFP)

Source: Dawn News, The News International