Pakistan acquits nine terror suspects

A PAKISTANI anti-terrorism court today acquitted nine men accused of involvement in the killing of a senior military officer and a deadly attack on an army bus, state media reported.

Judge Raja Ikhlaq Hussain acquitted the nine who were accused of involvement in the suicide bomb attacks on army surgeon general Lieutenant General Mushtaq Baig and the bus, the Associated Press of Pakistan said.

Their lawyer had pleaded that there was no evidence against them, it said.

The general, his driver and guard were killed along with five civilians and 25 people wounded in a suicide car bomb attack in the garrison city of Rawalpindi on February 25, 2008.

That came in the wake of another deadly attack in Rawalpindi when six people were killed and 38 wounded on February 4 when a suicide bomber rammed his motorcycle into an army bus taking medical staff to work.

Last week, a Pakistani court freed four men put on trial over the 2008 bombing of the five-star Marriott hotel in Islamabad that killed at least 60 people after the prosecution failed to prove the case.

A wave of attacks linked to Islamist militants has killed about 3,200 people around Pakistan since government forces fought gunmen holed up in the radical Islamabad Red Mosque in July 2007, sparking militant retaliation.

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