Several senior officers of Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) who are reported to be currently visiting Islamabad were the target of the blast at the Marriott Hotel which took place here tonight.

Well placed sources said that Marriott Hotel is usual hotel choice of the US officials and it seems that militants tipped off that certain high level US intelligence officers were currently staying at the hotel.

While no confirmation was available but Pakistan sources said it was clear that the explosion was aimed at specific targets based on a tip off

Originally posted by chaudri


Experts have found that Aluminum powder was used as additive in the explosive to give the explosion its fire-accelerating quality. The fire ignited by Aluminum can not be extinguished by usual measures like water etc.

The point is that Taliban usually use crude devices and chemicals for suicide bombings.

The chemicals & expertise used in this explosion are not available to Taliban.

Then who supplied the Aluminum powder material & technology to Taliban?

The Mitsubishi L300 van bomb was initially thought to have consisted of C4, a military grade plastic explosive which is difficult to obtain. However, investigators discovered the bomb was made from potassium chlorate,aluminum powder and sulfur. For the Sari club bomb with the L300 van, the team assembled 12 plastic filing cabinets filled with explosives. The cabinets, each containing a potassium chlorate, aluminum powder, sulfur mixture with TNT kicker-charges, was connected by 150 meters of PETN-filled detonating cord. Ninety-four RDX electric detonators were fitted to the TNT. The total weight of the van bomb was 1.125 tons.[5] The large, high-temperature blast damage produced by this mixture was similar to a thermobaric explosive[6],although the bombers may not have known this.[7]