Bombs kill 43 in Pakistan; amnesty case stirs tension

ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - Bombers struck in two Pakistani cities on Monday killing 43 people and wounding more than 100 as the Supreme Court began a hearing that could deepen political tension in the nuclear-armed country.

Two bombs went off in a market in the eastern city of Lahore killing 34 people and wounding 109, a top city official said, hours after a suicide bomber killed nine people outside a court in the northwestern city of Peshawar.

Pakistan, an ally that the United States needs to help fight the Taliban in Afghanistan, is facing relentless security troubles as well as U.S. pressure to step up its fight against militants.

Doubts are growing that President Asif Ali Zardari can survive politically in the long term, let alone lead the charge against Islamist fighters who have shown they can penetrate security near the headquarters of the all-powerful military.

Some of Zardari's closest aides may face revived corruption charges depending on the ruling of the Supreme Court, which took up legal challenges to an amnesty order granted to about 8,000 people, including the interior and defense ministers.

The politically charged issue could distract the government from a crackdown on the Taliban.

Pakistan's military, once a staunch supporter of Afghan militants in their fight against Soviet occupation in the 1980s, now faces brazen Taliban insurgents on its own soil.

Northwestern Peshawar has suffered the most from retaliatory bombings that have killed hundreds of people since October, when the army launched an offensive in South Waziristan on the Afghan border, part of a region seen as a global militant hub.

Another suicide bomber struck outside a city court on Monday, killing nine people.

The later attack in a market in Lahore, near the border with India, will revive fears that the militants want to expand their campaign out of the northwest.

Police said the two bombs were planted in the market and many of the victims were women.

Trader Mohammad Shami said the first bomb went off near an area where motorcycles were parked.

"All of a sudden there was another blast. I just shut my stall and ran," Shami said. Several shops were set ablaze.

U.S. PRESSURE

Pakistan's priority is defeating the Taliban at home, but the task has been complicated by U.S. pressure to root out fighters who cross the border to Afghanistan to attack U.S. troops.

President Barack Obama sent a clear message to Pakistan last week in his speech outlining plans to send 30,000 more U.S. troops to Afghanistan. Pakistan, he said, must not allow its territory to be used as a sanctuary for militants.

But Pakistan's military, which sets national security policy and makes decisions on Afghanistan, cannot afford to let its guard down in the fight against the Pakistani Taliban.

Last week, suicide bombers attacked a mosque near army headquarters in Rawalpindi. More than 40 people were killed.

Pakistan has little time to count its losses. Fresh questions are swirling over the whereabouts of Osama bin Laden and Western powers believe Islamabad is in the best position to answer them.

Interior Minister Rehman Malik said on Monday the al Qaeda leader was not in Pakistan. Experts have long believed he is hiding in the lawless frontier between Pakistan and Afghanistan.

Washington has not had any good intelligence on his whereabouts in years, U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said.

Zardari, the widower of assassinated former prime minister Benazir Bhutto, cannot be prosecuted whatever the outcome of the amnesty case because of presidential immunity.

But the re-opening of files could further tarnish his image as the opposition steps up demands for government figures protected by the decree to resign.

Zardari's government last month was forced to abandon plans to get parliamentary approval for the amnesty in the face of objections from a coalition partner and the opposition.

"This is a law of the jungle," Qazi Hussain Ahmed, an Islamist party opposition leader, told reporters outside the court. The hearing is likely to last for weeks.

The amnesty was introduced by former President Pervez Musharraf under a plan to bring Bhutto back from self-imposed exile under a power-sharing pact. Bhutto returned in October 2007 but she was assassinated just weeks later. (Additional reporting by Zeeshan Haider and Faris Ali; Editing by Robert Birsel)