KARACHI: The explosive used in a recent bombing in this port city of Pakistan was ‘C4’, a type used earlier in the abortive attempt to blow up President Pervez Musharraf’s convoy in Rawalpindi on December 14, 2003, investigators have said.

The investigators said the ballistics laboratory test had established that the highly explosive C4 type material, primarily used by military forces in the world, and now also by Al Qaeda operatives, was used in the April 11 suicide bombing at the Nishtar Park.

In Pakistan, C4 was used in a few incidents, including the attack on the president’s convoy in which the bomb was planted beneath the Jhanda Chichi Bridge in Rawalpindi.

The bomb did not explode as the president’s motorcade was equipped with jamming devices.

However, it went off as soon as the motorcade crossed the bridge, according to the investigators.

The same type of the explosive was used in the car-bomb blast near the US consulate in Karachi on March 2. Four people, including a US diplomat, were killed in the blast.

Another instance of C4 use was the suicide bombing at Madinatul Ilm at Gulshan-i-Iqbal here on May 31 last year.

The investigators said that C4 type of explosive was, however, used with a mix of nitrate, sulphur or fertilizer in some cases to ignite fire.

Investigators said that the kind of pellets used in the bomb had been used in suicide bombings at various places in the past. The modus operandi of the attack in Nishtar Park religious gathering was identical to the suicide attacks at the Ashura procession in Hangu’s main bazaar on February 9, 2006 and the annual religious gathering at Barri Imam shrine in Islamabad on May 28 last.

However, the investigators said, the identity of the suicide bomber in the Nishtar Park case could not be established as yet. Efforts were being made in this direction as a team of doctors had reconstructed the severed head of the suspected bomber. The head was collected from the scene of the blast.

Intelligence agencies, on the directives of the authorities in Islamabad, were probing into the case, they said.

“We have found some clues that indicated involvement of a sectarian group in the blast, but it would be premature to pinpoint any group or individual at this stage,” a senior investigator said. – Internews