Karachi shuts down as violence kills 43
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The southern Pakistani city of Karachi shut down in mourning on Tuesday as the death toll from Monday's suicide bomb attack on Shiite Muslims procession rose to 43.
Chief Minister of Sindh Province Syed Qaim Ali Shah has declared Tuesday a province-wide public holiday. All government and private offices are closed and transport off the roads in the provincial capital of Karachi.
The deadly violence also impacted the stock market in the financial hub, with the benchmark KSE-100 Index opening down 1.5 percent Tuesday but recovering in the early afternoon.
Sindh Secretary Hashim Raza Zaidi said that several more injured died of wounds in hospitals, adding that up to 90 people were injured and some of them in critical condition in the most deadly attack in Karachi in two years.
No group has yet claimed responsibility for the attack, but Altaf Hussain, leader of the Mutahida Qaumi Movement said that it was handiwork of the Taliban militants.
Angry protesters attacked government buildings and set markets, banks and vehicles on fire in different parts of Karachi after the attack.
Pictures taken by Xinhua photographer Anwar Abbas show the panicked people and burning police vehicles on the busy Jinnah road in Karachi. Abbas was injured in the riot.
Pakistan's Interior Minister Rehman Malik visited Karachi on Tuesday and set up an investigation committee.
It was the third bomb blast in Karachi in three days as the worshippers have been commemorating Ashura, the holy event on the Shiite Muslim calendar, and the parade in Karachi was the biggest in Pakistan.
President Asif Ali Zardari, Prime Minister Syed Yousuf Raza Gilani, political and religious leaders called for calm and restraint after the "most reprehensible act of terror".
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