PESHAWAR, Pakistan, May 12, (AFP): Bomb and mortar attacks killed at least two people and wounded 21 others in Pakistan’s northwestern city of Peshawar, a gateway to the tribal badlands, police said on Saturday.
“A remote-controlled bomb exploded as a police van carrying four prisoners passed by an abandoned tin of vegetable oil in Peshawar city on Saturday, killing one policeman and wounding 17 others,” local police official Mohammed Asif said.
A woman and four policemen were among those wounded.
Another local police official, Javed Iqbal, also confirmed the incident and casualties.
Nobody claimed responsibility for the blast but Islamist militants have carried out several attacks in the city.
A taxi driver was killed when a mortar bomb hit his cab in the upmarket Hayatabad area of Peshawar on Friday night, police official Tahir Ayub said.
Ayub said the headquarters of the paramilitary Frontier Constabulary in the area was apparently the target of the mortar bombs fired from the neighbouring Khyber tribal region.
“However, three mortars landed in open spaces while three others hit a house, a taxi cab and a shop,” he said, adding that at least four people were wounded in the attack.
Peshawar, with a population of 2.5 million people, has long been on the frontline of violence blamed on an insurgency led by Taliban militants opposed to Islamabad’s alliance with the United States.
Pakistan has battled the homegrown insurgency for years, with more than 3,000 soldiers killed in the battle against militancy.
According to an AFP tally, around 5,000 people have been killed in militant attacks across the country since July 2007, when government troops raided an extremist mosque in the capital Islamabad, sparking a bloody insurgency.
There were about 120 bomb attacks in Pakistan in 2011, up on the 96 bomb blasts in 2010, but far lower than violence in 2009 when there were 203 bombings across the country, according to an AFP tally.

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KARACHI: Pakistan said Friday it had seized one of its largest ever hauls of heroin, impounding 125 kilograms (275 pounds) of the narcotic worth an estimated $13.75 million on the international market.
The seizure is the largest since May last year when the authorities seized 375 kilograms of the drug.
The authorities examined a refrigerated container at Karachi port and found bags of heroin concealed by solution tape and balloons.
“All 5,400 bags were de-stuffed and thoroughly examined and we found 830 pouches each weighing between 145 grams to 155 grams. The total weight of heroin was 125 kilograms,” Babar Ali Shah, a customs official told reporters.
“We have arrested the clearing agent and one of his employees,” Shah said.
Officials said the heroin was smuggled from neighbouring Afghanistan through Pakistan’s northwestern province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
“This is the second biggest heroin seizure in the history of Pakistan,” another customs official Qamar Thalho said, putting the value of the stash at $0.55 million on the local market and $13.75 million on the international market. He said the narcotic hidden in a container was booked for Malaysia.
Pakistan has more than four million drug addicts in a population of nearly 180 million, according to figures compiled by the ANF, which is responsible for investigating and prosecuting drug offences.