Heavily armed militants launched an assault on Jinnah International Airport in Karachi, leaving at least 26 dead including 10 militants in a six-hour siege that the army quelled at dawn.
Explosions and gunfire rang out as the attackers, some dressed in military uniforms, battled security forces in one of the most brazen attacks in years on Pakistan’s biggest city.
Authorities said all 10 militants had been killed and that at least 16 dead bodies including ASF and PIA personnel and two civilians were received by the city’s main Jinnah Hospital.
“Update: Area cleared. No damage to aircraft, fire visible in pics was not plane but a building, now extinguished. All vital assets intact,” military spokesman Major General Asim Bajwa said in a tweet.
The assault forced the closure of the Jinnah International Airport but Bajwa said it would be ready to resume services later in the day.
The attack will raise fresh concerns about Pakistan’s shaky security situation, and questions about how militants were able to penetrate the airport which serves one of the world’s biggest cities.
No one has yet claimed responsibility for the assault, but it came as talks between Pakistan and the Taliban which began earlier this year hit an impasse.
Officials said the gunmen entered from at least two sides of the airport at around 11:00pm yesterday night, the terminal is used for the hajj pilgrimage and an engineering section close to an old terminal that is no longer in use.
Armed with guns, grenades and rocket launchers, they clashed with the airport’s security force, police, paramilitaries and later commandos.
A reporter at the airport witnessed three “huge” blasts, in what intelligence officials at the scene said they believed were suicide bombers detonating their explosives.
Broken glass and spent gun magazines littered the engineering section where the first exchange of gunfire took place as smoke from grenade attacks began to die down.
“I heard fierce firing and then saw the terrorists firing at security forces. I don’t know a lot more than that,” said eyewitness Sarmad Hussain, an employee of national carrier Pakistan International Airlines
Syed Saim Rizvi, who was on board a plane on the runway, tweeted: “Huge blast!!!! I do not know whats going on outside — heavy firing started again – full panic on board!”
The director of the city’s main Jinnah Hospital, Seemi Jamali, said that 16 dead bodies including seven ASF and six PIA personnel and two civilians had been brought in, along with the partial remains of two other unidentified bodies.
Another 23 people were wounded, he told the media.
A spokesman for PIA, Mashud Tajwar, said that two domestic flights bound for Karachi had been diverted to nearby airports.
