Oct 19, 2007 5:04 pm US/Central
Chicago's Pakistani Community On Edge After Attack
More Than 130 People Died In Suicide Bomb Attack That Targeted Former Primse Minister Benazir Bhutto
CHICAGO (CBS) ―
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Member of Chicaogo's Pakistani community expressed concern after a suicide bombing targeted at former prime minister Benazir Bhutto killed more than 130 people in Karachi Oct. 18, 2007.
CBS
A former prime minister of Pakistan accuses al Qaida and Taliban militants of trying to assassinate her upon her re-entry Thursday into Pakistan after years in exile. The bomb attack killed more than 130 people.
As CBS 2's Mike Parker reports, the suicide attack that also injured 200 too 300 people was apparently intended to kill pro-democracy leader Benazir Bhutto. Emotional shockwaves are being felt in Chicago's Pakistani community along the Far North Side's Devon Avenue.
"I hate terrorism," Rana Javed said. "I hate those kind of people who do this."
A journalist who writes for Chicago's "News Pakistan Weekly," Javed talked by phone Friday with a witness who saw a security guard grab one of the bombers.
"He just run behind him and he grab him and the bomb blows, second bomb. And he die by himself, boom," Javed said.
The owner of the Zam Zam Cafe says his fellow Pakistanis in Chicago are worried.
"They are feeling very scary and they are feeling that could be spread out all over Pakistan," Mumtaz Rizvi said.
A local supporter of Bhutto's says only her election as prime minister can save the nation.
"We need free and fair elections in Pakistan," Aasif Malik said. "That's the solution."
"We need the schools, we need colleges, we need hospitals," he added.
Bhutto supporters here in Chicago are also suspicious of how security was handled before the bombing. It was after sundown, they say. Why were the street lights turned off, they wonder.
(© MMX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
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