<p>At least 17 people were killed and 30 others injured today when a suicide bomber blew himself up in a crowded court in Pakistan's restive northwest, an attack the Taliban said was revenge for the hanging of liberal Punjab province governor Salman Taseer's Islamist assassin.<br /><br /></p>.<p>The suicide bomber blew himself up inside the district court's compound in Shabqadar Bazaar of Charsadda district in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa.<br /><br />At least 17 people, including two policemen, were killed while 30 others were wounded in the attack, offcials said.<br /><br />The Jamatul Ahrar, a splinter group of the banned Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), claimed responsibility for the attack, saying that it was carried out to avenge the hanging of Mumtaz Qadri, killer of Taseer.<br /><br />Qadri was hanged last Tuesday at a Rawalpindi jail after his appeal against the conviction was rejected by the Supreme Court.<br /><br />Security and emergency teams reached the blast site and sealed the area. A probe was immediately launched into the assault, Dawn News reported.<br /><br />Shabqadar tehsil is close to Mohmand tribal region, which is one of seven semi-autonomous tribal regions in the northwest, where Pakistani Taliban and al-Qaeda-linked militants were said to have carved out strongholds.<br /><br />Shabqadar is some 30 kilometres west of Charsadda, where militants attacked a university on January 20 in an attack that left 21 people, mostly students, dead.<br /><br />At the time of the explosion, the courts were crowded after a break over the weekend.<br /><br />The police said the bomber was intercepted but managed to explode his vest wrapped around his body.<br /><br />Qadri, deputed on the security of Taseer, had killed the governor at a market close to the latter's house in 2011 in Islamabad for allegedly criticising the controversial blasphemy laws and was convicted the same year.<br /><br />Qadri's execution triggered protests by thousands of Islamists who called it a "black day".<br /><br />Taseer, who died aged 66, had termed the blasphemy regulations, introduced by Pakistan's military ruler Zia-ul-Haq in 1980s, as "black laws" drawing the ire of extremists.</p>
<p>At least 17 people were killed and 30 others injured today when a suicide bomber blew himself up in a crowded court in Pakistan's restive northwest, an attack the Taliban said was revenge for the hanging of liberal Punjab province governor Salman Taseer's Islamist assassin.<br /><br /></p>.<p>The suicide bomber blew himself up inside the district court's compound in Shabqadar Bazaar of Charsadda district in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa.<br /><br />At least 17 people, including two policemen, were killed while 30 others were wounded in the attack, offcials said.<br /><br />The Jamatul Ahrar, a splinter group of the banned Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), claimed responsibility for the attack, saying that it was carried out to avenge the hanging of Mumtaz Qadri, killer of Taseer.<br /><br />Qadri was hanged last Tuesday at a Rawalpindi jail after his appeal against the conviction was rejected by the Supreme Court.<br /><br />Security and emergency teams reached the blast site and sealed the area. A probe was immediately launched into the assault, Dawn News reported.<br /><br />Shabqadar tehsil is close to Mohmand tribal region, which is one of seven semi-autonomous tribal regions in the northwest, where Pakistani Taliban and al-Qaeda-linked militants were said to have carved out strongholds.<br /><br />Shabqadar is some 30 kilometres west of Charsadda, where militants attacked a university on January 20 in an attack that left 21 people, mostly students, dead.<br /><br />At the time of the explosion, the courts were crowded after a break over the weekend.<br /><br />The police said the bomber was intercepted but managed to explode his vest wrapped around his body.<br /><br />Qadri, deputed on the security of Taseer, had killed the governor at a market close to the latter's house in 2011 in Islamabad for allegedly criticising the controversial blasphemy laws and was convicted the same year.<br /><br />Qadri's execution triggered protests by thousands of Islamists who called it a "black day".<br /><br />Taseer, who died aged 66, had termed the blasphemy regulations, introduced by Pakistan's military ruler Zia-ul-Haq in 1980s, as "black laws" drawing the ire of extremists.</p>