A group of heavily armed Taliban terrorists on Thursday gunned down nine policemen and injured as many in this eastern Pakistani city after storming a building where dozens of security personnel were living.
The terrorists came to the densely populated neighbourhood of Ichra early on Friday morning in a car and three motorcycles and burst into the building after killing a lone policeman who was deployed outside.
"Nine policemen were killed in the attack," Punjab police chief Haji Habib-ur-Rehman told reporters at the scene of the attack.
Lahore city police chief Aslam Tareen said nine others were injured. Rehman said the attack was carried out by a group of about 10 terrorists.
This was the second major attack on Pakistani security forces since the government reopened North Atlantic Treaty Organisation supply routes to Afghanistan.
On Monday, seven soldiers and a policeman were killed when Taliban fighters attacked a Pakistan army camp near Gujrat city.
A total of 37 policemen from the prison department of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province in the northwest were living in the building. They had come to Lahore for training at the National Academy for Prison Administration.
"The attackers killed a policeman who was guarding the building's entrance. They split into three groups and went through three floors, attacking others who were sleeping," Rehman said.
The terrorists were armed with assault rifles, pistols and grenades. Officials said they had called in the bomb disposal squad to defuse a grenade that failed to explode.
The banned Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan claimed responsibility for the attack.
Taliban spokesman Ehsanullah Ehsan told the media that the attack was carried out in retaliation for the 'torture' of Taliban fighters in prisons in Punjab. Ehsan threatened more attacks in future.
