Pakistan gunmen hit police training site in Lahore

Two dozen recruits may be dead. The assailants hit swiftly and held hundreds hostage in an hours-long siege before being overpowered.

By Mubashir Zaidi and Laura King
Los Angeles Times
4:24 AM PDT, March 30, 2009

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan and ISTANBUL, Turkey — In a chillingly methodical attack, gunmen in police uniforms today stormed a police training center in the eastern city of Lahore, reportedly killing up to two dozen recruits and holding scores of others hostage before being overpowered.

The daylong siege — which ended with an announcement by the Interior Ministry that four of the assailants had been killed and a fifth arrested — was yet another sign of intensifying turmoil in Pakistan, considered a crucial U.S. ally in the fight against Islamic militants.

President Obama declared last week that quelling the insurgency in Pakistan is key to Western success in the war in neighboring Afghanistan. He tied continuing aid to Pakistan with progress in confronting militants.

The assault on the police compound, which began at about 8 a.m., was as swift and sudden as it was audacious.

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