<

Blasts at 18 Petrol Stations

Thursday, May 15, 2003
(1:06 PM)
News 24

"Shell pumps will always be on the hit-list as it is a foreign enterprise and we have also taken precautions for the security of food chains KFC, Macdonald's and Pizza Hut. They (the attackers) have tried to indicate that such spots would be their target and we have taken comprehensive security measures on all these installations."

KARACHI -- N24
A series of explosions caused minor damage to 18 petrol stations owned by Anglo-Dutch firm Shell in Pakistan's southern city of Karachi early on Thursday, police and company officials said.

"The explosions at Shell petrol pumps occurred between 04:00 (01:00 SA time) to 05:00 (02:00 SA time) and there were no injuries," Sindh province police chief Kamal Shah said.

"These were firecrackers with timed devices fixed on them which caused explosions with a gap of five to 10 minutes at Shell petrol pumps in different parts of the city," Shah said.

Karachi's police chief, Tariq Jamil, said 18 of the city's 96 Shell gas stations were targeted.

"No group has claimed responsibility and no arrests have been made," Jamil said.

"It is believed that the devices had been planted by some motorcyclists late on Wednesday night when thousands of motorcyclists flooded city roads to celebrate the birth anniversary of Prophet Mohammad," Shah said.
(More: News24.com)
2003 © News 24.

Dan