Karachi CID building hit by bomb and gun attack

“Everyone started panicking and running toward the changing rooms. Some of my friends have been injured and have been taken to hospital.”

The BBC’s Shoaib Hasan, in Islamabad, says that CID officials and their offices – including this building – have been targeted in Karachi in the past.

Our correspondent adds that the latest attack comes a day after the same unit arrested several wanted militants in the city, said to belong to Lashkar-e-Jhangvi – Pakistan’s most dangerous militant group.

The group, which is closely linked to al-Qaeda, has been involved in a string of high profile attacks across the country.

It is unclear whether the suspects were being detained in the complex at the time of the attack but the BBC’s Aleem Maqbool, in Islamabad, says that in the past, such detainees may well have been held and interrogated in the CID compound.

Mohammad Aslam Khan, of the CID, told the BBC that he believed the arrested men were planning to carry out bombings on Shia processions in the city.