Dozens die in Pakistan attacks
Updated on 15 October 2009
At least 38 people are killed as militants launch a wave of co-ordinated attacks on police and security buildings in Lahore and the north west. Sue Turton reports.
Gunmen armed with grenades and suicide vests stormed police buildings in the heart of the country's second largest city.
In these latest attacks on the security forces, militants attacked three police buildings simultaneously in Lahore,
This comes as the country prepares for a military offensive in South Waziristan.
The attacks began when a suicide car bomber set off explosives outside a police station in Kohat, killing 10 people.
That was followed by attacks on police in Lahore.
Seven people were killed when gunmen attacked a regional headquarters of the police's Federal Investigation Agency.
One of the dead was a gunman and at least four were police officials, police said.
Gunmen also attacked two police training centres in Lahore, one of them a training school attacked this year and the other the police academy.
City police chief Pervez Rathore said six policemen and four gunmen were killed at the Manawa training centre. He said three of the attackers blew themselves up.
The Pakistan government has said a ground offensive against an estimated 10,000 hard core Taliban is imminent in South Waziristan.
The government says most attacks in the country are plotted there and carried out by Taliban, often with the help of allies from militant groups based in Punjab province.
The government in June ordered the army to launch an offensive in South Waziristan. Since then the military has been conducting air and artillery strikes to soften up the militants' defences.
The government says the assault is imminent but it will be up to the army to decide when to send in ground troops.
