LAHORE, Pakistan - Militants who attacked a minority sect, killing 93 people in the country's east, belonged to the Pakistani Taliban and were trained in a lawless border region where the US wants Islamabad to mount an army operation, police said Saturday. The revelation could help the US persuade Pakistan that rooting out the various extremist groups in North Waziristan is in Islamabad's own interest. Up to now, Pakistan has resisted, in part because it says its army is stretched thin in operations elsewhere. The attacks ��" the deadliest ever against the Ahmadi sect reviled by mainstream Muslims ��" occurred minutes apart Friday in two neighborhoods in the eastern city of Lahore, Pakistan's second-largest city and a key political, military, and cultural center. Two teams of gunmen, including some in suicide vests, stormed two mosques and sprayed bullets at worshippers while holding off police. At least two of the seven attackers were captured, while some died in the standoff or by detonating their explosives. Militants have used such tactics in attacking Pakistan's U.S.-allied government and foreign and security targets often in the past, but violence against religious minorities had previously not been waged in such a large-scale, sophisticated fashion. Local TV channels had been reporting that the Pakistani Taliban, or one of their affiliates, had claimed responsibility for the attacks. Senior police officer Akram Naeem in Lahore said the interrogation of one of the arrested suspects revealed that the gunmen were involved with the Pakistani Taliban. The 17-year-old suspect told police that the men had trained in the North Waziristan tribal region. "Our initial investigation has found that they all belong to Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan," or Pakistani Taliban movement, Naeem said. He said the suspect, "Abdullah alias Mohammad, was given terrorism training in Miran Shah" ��" the main city in North Waziristan. North Waziristan has long been filled with militant groups focused on battling US and NATO forces across the border in Afghanistan. But as the army has mounted operations against the Pakistani Taliban elsewhere in the lawless tribal belt, many in the group, which has focused on attacking Pakistan, have since set up shop in North Waziristan. Suspicion that the man accused of a failed bombing attempt in New York's Times Square earlier this month may have received aid from the Pakistani Taliban has added to US urgency about clearing North Waziristan. Before the Pakistani Taliban began operating in the tribal border region, Islamabad was believed to want to avoid taking on the area because the militant networks there were not threatening targets inside the country. Critics also suspect Pakistan wants to maintain good relations with some of those Afghan-focused militant networks so that it will have allies in Afghanistan once the US leaves the region.
