Islamabad - Explosions rocked Pakistan's troubled north-western region and a nearby garrison town on Friday, killing at least 26 people, mostly civilians, officials and media reports said. A suicide bomber killed seven people and wounded more than a dozen outside the Pakistan Air Force's main production and maintenance facility in the eastern province of Punjab, police said.
The attacker, who was on a bicycle, blew himself up when he was stopped at a checkpoint near the Pakistan Aeronautical Complex in the garrison town of Kamra, located close to the restive North-West Frontier Province (NWFP).
"Seven people have been killed and 14 others injured in the blast that took place at around 7:30 am [0130 GMT]," local police chief Fakhar Sultan Raja said.
Two of the dead were air force personnel and the others were civilians, Raja said.
Earlier, a local junior police officer had said the blast was caused by a car bombing.
Friday's assault was likely to spark concern among some defence experts in the West because some analysts believe Pakistan might be keeping jet fighters that can carry nuclear warheads at the airbase in Kamra.
The only nuclear-armed Islamic state has asserted that its atomic arsenal, which is kept at undisclosed locations, is safe.
"We have confidence in the Pakistani government and military's control over nuclear weapons," US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said earlier this month.
Hours after the suicide attack, a car bomb exploded outside a restaurant in an upmarket neighbourhood of Peshawar city, capital of the militancy-plagued NWFP.
The blast did not cause any fatalities but nine people were injured, hospital authorities said.
"None of the injured are in critical condition," a spokesman for the Hayatabad Medical Complex told reporters.
Television footage showed damaged buildings and a destroyed car surrounded by the mangled remains of the exploding vehicle.
Bomb disposal experts said the explosion was caused by a remote-controlled device.
The attack was the latest in a series of bombings and raids on security and civilian targets that have killed nearly 180 people in October alone as Pakistani forces pressed ahead with a major offensive against the Taliban in the South Waziristan tribal district, which borders Afghanistan.
Islamabad was the scene of earlier strikes, including twin suicide bombings Tuesday at an Islamic university that killed at least seven people. Five students - three women and two men - were among the casualties.
On Thursday, gunmen shot dead an army brigadier and his dri
