Suicide car bomber kills four in NW Pakistan

Police officials survey the site of a suicide bomb attack at a police station in Karak, in Pakistan's restive North West Frontier Province, February 27, 2010.

PARACHINAR, Pakistan (Reuters) - A suicide car bomber killed three policemen and a child Saturday in an attack on a police station in a northwestern Pakistani town, police said.

Al Qaeda-linked Pakistani militants have carried out numerous attacks on members of the security forces over the past couple of years, and they stepped up strikes after the army launched an offensive on their main bastion in October.

The blast in the town of Karak, 200 km (125 miles) southwest of Islamabad, came as police were on the alert for potential sectarian attacks on religious processions to mark the anniversary of the Prophet Mohammad's birth.

"The blast destroyed part of police station and a nearby mosque," police official Gul Sadi Khan told Reuters, adding three policemen had been killed. "Thirteen people have been wounded and we fear more people are trapped under the debris."

Another police official said a child passer-by had also been killed.

Karak is in North West Frontier Province, which has borne the brunt of attacks over the past year.

The Pakistani Taliban, allies of the Afghan Taliban, have lost much ground in army offensives over the past year.

The were pushed out of the Swat valley, northwest of Islamabad, and in October the army began a big offensive in the militants' South Waziristan bastion on the Afghan border.

INVESTORS NERVOUS

Pakistani action against militants on the border is seen as crucial for efforts to bring stability to Afghanistan, where U.S. forces are spearheading one of NATO's biggest offensive against the Afghan Taliban.

Security forces have also carried out several smaller operations aimed at pushing back militants threatening towns and cities such as Peshawar, the main city in the northwest.

Paramilitary officials said Saturday that 25 militants had been killed in recent days in the latest such operation launched this week in a region about 35 km (20 miles) south of Peshawar.

Fears of militant attacks on Saturday's religious holiday hurt trade in stocks the previous day with the Karachi Stock Exchange benchmark 100-share index slipping 0.1 percent, as other regional markets rose, and turnover at a 2-month low.

Fifty-seven people were killed in Karachi in a militant attack on a Muslim congregation marking the holiday in 2006.

The attack on the congregation, organized by the moderate Barelvi Sunni Muslim sect, sparked violence in Pakistan's commercial capital and the stock exchange shut for a day.

Police in Karachi said late Friday they had arrested three suspected members of the banned Lashkar-e-Jhangvi militant group and seized 20 kg (44 lb) of explosives and detonators from them.

The three had planned to attack "important religious events," said senior city police official Fayyaz Khan.

In a separate incident, gunmen fired on a religious procession on the outskirts of the northwestern town of Dera Ismail Khan, wounding four people, police said.

(Additional reporting by Faisal Aziz in Karachi; Writing by Augustine Anthony; Editing by Robert Birsel and Alex Richardson)