At least 11 people were killed and dozens of others were wounded on Monday after gunmen stormed a court in a busy district in the Pakistani capital of Islamabad.

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Police said the deadly incident began with gunfire by two or three attackers followed by two suicide blasts.

“All the attackers fled though one sustained injuries in the leg and back,” Islamabad police chief Sikandar Hayat told reporters.

Pakistan has been fighting a bloody insurgency led by homegrown Taliban since 2007, but the extremists have rarely targeted locations within the capital in recent years.

No one immediately claimed responsibility for the attack.

The deadly assaults on the court complex, which killed at least one judge, took place after the Taliban declared a one-month ceasefire over the weekend in order to pursue stalled peace negotiations with the government.

Rubble and broken glass littered the site of the blast at the F8 market area as residents and police rushed around in bloodstained clothes.

Reports said pools of blood and severed body parts were scattered in the area of the capital where judges' chambers and lawyers' offices are located.

(FRANCE 24 with Reurters, AFP, AP)



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