Attackers Strike Sect Mosques in Pakistan

Islamist gunmen and a suicide squad lobbed grenades, sprayed bullets from atop a minaret and took hostages in attacks on two mosques packed with worshippers from a minority sect in Pakistan. At least 80 people were killed and dozens wounded.

The strikes - the deadliest against the Ahmadi community - highlight the threat to minority religious groups by the same militants who have repeatedly attacked Pakistan's US-allied government and threatened to destabilise the nuclear-armed nation.

The tactics echoed those militants have used against government, foreign and security targets in Pakistan, but they had never before been directed against a religious minority.

Two teams of heavily armed attackers - seven men in total - staged the raids minutes apart, seizing hostages and apparently planning to fight to the death. Three died when they detonated their suicide vests. Two were captured.

"It was like a war going on around me. The cries I heard sent chills down my spine," said Luqman Ahmad, a survivor.

Shiite Muslims have borne the brunt of individual suicide bombings and targeted killings for years in Sunni-majority Pakistan, though Christians and Ahmadis have also faced violence. The long-standing sectarian violence in the country has been exacerbated by the rise of the Sunni extremist Taliban and al-Qaida movements.

Pakistan's Geo TV channel said the Punjab province branch of the Pakistani Taliban had claimed responsibility, however repeated attempts by The Associated Press to reach the group were not successful. The Pakistani Taliban are believed to have played a role in the failed car bomb attempt in New York City's Times Square earlier this month.

Ahmadis are reviled as heretics by mainstream Muslims for their belief that their sect's founder was a savior foretold by the Quran, Islam's holy book. The group has experienced years of state-sanctioned discrimination and occasional attacks by radical Sunni Muslims in Pakistan, but never before in such a large-scale, sophisticated fashion.

The attacks took place in the Model Town and Garhi Shahu neighborhoods of Lahore.