Tehran terms Karachi bombing part of anti-Islamic plot

09 May, 2004

Iran on Saturday called the suicide bombing of a Shia mosque in Karachi, which killed at least 14 people, part of a plot against Islam.
"At the present juncture, ethnic wars and religious differences are part of the plots hatched by the enemies of Islam, which serve their interests," said Foreign Ministry Spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi said in reaction to Friday's blast which also wounded more than 90 people.
Asefi stressed the need for "all Islamic sects to defuse these plots with vigilance and unity" while speaking to the state news agency, IRNA.
He called for the bomb plotters to be punished, and offered his condolences to relatives of the victims.
The suicide blast has sparked a fresh wave of violence between Shiites and Sunnis in Karachi, which has a history of ethnic, political and sectarian bloodshed.
The Islamic Republic is dominated by the Shiite sect, which forms about 20 percent of Pakistan's Sunni-dominated 150 million population.

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