PESHAWAR: Aftab Ahmed Sherpao, the target of a suicide attack that killed 56 people in Charsada, who also survived another attack earlier this year, vowed Sunday he would not give in to militant violence.
Aftab Sherpao, a former interior minister and close ally of President Pervez Musharraf who led a clampdown against Islamic militants, told a news conference that he would continue campaigning for next month’s elections.
"My movement will not be restricted after this incident," Sherpao said in the northwest provincial capital of Peshawar.
"This has enhanced my determination to serve my people," he said. "Those who want to eliminate me — if they think that I will be discouraged, then they have misunderstood me."
At least 56 people were killed when a suicide bomber blew himself up at a mosque inside Sherpao’s nearby residential compound on Friday, when the faithful were marking the Islamic holiday of Eid al-Adha.
Sherpao was the interior minister in the former government before Musharraf appointed a caretaker administration ahead of the January 8 elections for parliament, which Sherpao is contesting.
He was the government point man in a clampdown on militants, which saw the military raid a radical, pro-Taliban mosque in Islamabad in July that left around 100 people dead. Pakistan is battling an increasing militant insurgency.
There have been more than 40 suicide attacks, once rare in the country, this year. Sherpao survived a suicide blast in April that killed at least 24 people.