Pakistan Bombing Kills 49

Officials Reiterate Plans for Offensive

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, Oct. 9 -- A car bomb ripped through a bustling market and killed 49 people in the northwestern city of Peshawar on Friday morning, Pakistani officials said, prompting the government to renew its pledge to wage an offensive in a militant-heavy region along the Afghan border.

At least 106 people were wounded in the suicide blast, said Zahir Ali Shah, health minister of North-West Frontier Province, of which Peshawar is the capital. The bomber detonated his explosives-packed sedan near a bus stop, mangling nearby vehicles and causing panic among shoppers and commuters. There was no immediate assertion of responsibility.

The bombing was the latest in a handful of recent attacks in Peshawar, and it occurred five days after a suicide bombing at a highly secured U.N. office in Islamabad, Pakistan's capital, killed five employees. The Pakistani Taliban asserted responsibility for that blast.

As in the other attacks, Friday's bombing, which occurred not far from the provincial assembly and a paramilitary base, displayed militants' ability to strike crowded and protected targets. Earlier Friday in Peshawar, militants ambushed and set ablaze a tanker carrying fuel to U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan, according to the Associated Press.

"We have received some reports from our security agencies that the provincial assembly . . . cabinet members and other government installations are on the hit list of the terrorists," Mian Iftikhar Hussain, a provincial spokesman, told reporters in Peshawar. "But we will not surrender."

After the bombing, Interior Minister Rehman Malik said the military would soon launch an offensive in the restive tribal area of South Waziristan, which borders Afghanistan and is considered a stronghold of al-Qaeda and the Taliban. But Malik did not say when the offensive would begin. Villagers in the mountainous region have been on alert since plans for the operation emerged in recent days.

Malik has said Pakistani Taliban forces in South Waziristan are plotting vengeance for the death of their leader, Baitullah Mehsud, who was killed by a U.S. drone strike in August.

"There is no other option but to attack the strongholds of militants," Malik said in Peshawar. "The common people in Waziristan are also demanding an operation against the terrorists operating in their area."

The Taliban has threatened to step up attacks if the Pakistani army goes forward with its plans, and analysts said Friday's blast seemed to offer gruesome proof of the insurgents' willingness to act on their threats. But some said it also exposed a lack of resolve within the military, which U.S. officials have prodded to be tougher on the insurgents, who use Pakistan as a base for plotting attacks on international forces in Afghanistan.

"The government should act, not simply use rhetoric," said Mahmood Shah, a retired army general and security analyst. "They are alerting the militants, and therefore the militants are carrying out preemptive strikes to pressure the government."

Witnesses said that the blast scattered debris and blood throughout the Khyber Bazaar area and that the toll would probably have been greater had it occurred on any other day of the week. Friday is the Muslim day of prayer.

"Most of the shops were closed," witness Javed Ali said in a telephone interview. "Otherwise, it could have killed hundreds."

Brulliard reported from Kabul.