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LAHORE, Pakistan (AFP) - A suicide car bomb on Wednesday flattened a police building in Pakistan's city of Lahore, killing nine people, wounding scores more and trapping policemen under the rubble, officials said.
The blast - the third deadly attack to rock the country's liberal cultural capital in as many months - points to a widening net of Islamist violence which has killed more than 1,800 people across Pakistan in less than two years.
A suicide car bomber tried to ram past a security barrier outside the police emergency response unit, adjacent to the provincial headquarters of Pakistan's premier intelligence agency, before exploding in the road, officials said.
Rescue workers carried out the injured on their backs, stumbling over the debris, while people tried to dig out one man in a traditional white shirt who lay trapped and helpless under stones and wooden planks.
"I heard firing and then a huge blast," said one policeman who staggered out of the wreckage, saying that there were 30-35 policemen inside the building.
"The building collapsed. I was at the back of the building and am fortunately alive. I was on duty and listening to calls when it happened," he told reporters.
The injured lay trapped and helpless underneath the debris after the attack in the city's commercial district, two months after a deadly assault on a police training academy near Lahore claimed by Pakistan's Taliban commander.
Officials confirmed the car was blown up by a suicide bomber and police said they were investigating the possibility that there was more than one attacker.
"It was a suicide car bomb attack," police official Omar Ahmad told AFP.
The chief of Lahore city administration, Sajjad Bhutta, said the attacker tried to breach a road block and get close to the building.
"A vehicle bomb exploded just outside the police rescue offices, destroying the office, damaging nearby buildings and injuring people," he told reporters.
"The building collapsed and people may be trapped under the rubble. A petrol station was also damaged, its roof collapsed," Bhutta added.
Police said there was firing immediately before the explosion, but the origin of the fire was not immediately clear.
A top police official said nine people were killed - the majority of them policemen - and 60 wounded.
Doctor Asma Malik of Lahore's Ganga Ram Hospital told AFP that eight people were killed and about 80 wounded.
Local television showed images of frantic crowds gathering around the destroyed buildings, as volunteers picked through the rubble and twisted metal.
The windows of nearby buildings, including a hospital, were blown out.
Cars were flattened, while rows of motorcycles lay on their sides, knocked over or destroyed by the explosion.
Police sub-inspector Khalid Baig said some policemen managed to escape with injuries, but that around 30 to 35 policemen were trapped under the debris.
"Several nearby buildings were also damaged. A petrol pump was also damaged, its roof collapsed," said Bhutta.
On March 30, attackers armed with guns, grenades and suicide vests stormed a police training centre on the outskirts of Lahore, unleashing eight hours of gun battles and killing seven police cadets and a civilian.
That attack was claimed by Pakistani Taliban chief Baitullah Mehsud - a man with a five-million-dollar bounty on his head offered by the United States - who threatened to carry out further attacks across the country.
On March 3, gunmen ambushed the Sri Lankan cricket team bus in Lahore on its way to a test match with Pakistan that left eight Pakistanis dead and ended hopes of the country hosting international sport in the immediate future.
Pakistan's military has been locked in a one-month offensive against Taliban militants in three regions of the northwest.
The nuclear-armed nation has been beset by militant violence for two years, with 1,872 people killed in suicide and bomb attacks since July 2007.
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