One day after at least 36 people (including 10 militants) were killed in a Taliban attack on Jinnah International Airport in Karachi, two insurgents on motorbikes reportedly attempted to crash the airport grounds, fleeing after an exchange of gunfire with guards.
In an inadvertently unsettling commentary on the state of affairs in Pakistan’s largest city, an official told reporters that the armed assault by a terrorist group didn’t even really count as an attack at all. From the New York Times:
An airport security official, Colonel Tahir Ali, played down the violence, saying that only two attackers engaged the security guards with gunfire.
“It was not an attack as such. They came and fired,” the official said.
Also disturbing: the bodies of seven previously unreported victims of the Taliban’s first attack were found at the airport Tuesday morning, well after it had reopened to passengers.
