19 May 2004	Wednesday	28 Rabi-ul-Awwal 1425

LAHORE, May 18: Police on Tuesday defused two bombs in a shop at Bank Stop in Kot Lakhpat. Had the bombs exploded, many lives would have been lost in the crowded locality, Model Town SP Farhan Mirza told Dawn.

Having inspected the bombs, he believed that they were meant to be used somewhere else, and somebody had left them in the area, intentionally or unintentionally. "It was highly explosive material."

Mr Mirza said the bombs had been placed in the shop of a barber, Mahmood Ahmad. Wrapped in gift-packing, he added, each of the bombs weighed one and a half kilograms.

The shopkeeper told police that two men had visited him for a shave, one of whom called the other Ibrahim. He said he found the two gift packs stuffed under a table shortly after the two men walked away. He said he ran after them, but they disappeared in the market.

Mahmood said he tore off one of the wrappers but took to his heels on seeing live wires inside. He reported the matter to Kot Lakhpat police, stationed hardly a few yards away from his shop.

The police called in the Bomb Disposal Squad, who defused the devices with the help of police. Each of the bombs had a timer and a battery attached to it, a BDS official, Saleem Ahmad, said.

Found dead: Four people were found dead in various parts of the city on Tuesday. The police said Zahoor Ahmad (50), the watchman of a vocational institute on Jam Road in Mustafaabad, was found dead when a sweeper visited him in the morning. He had been strangled with his hands and legs tied, they said.

A woman, aged about 50, and a man around 55, both unidentified, were found dead in Township and Garhi Shahu, respectively. No injury marks were found on the bodies, said the police and believed they might have died from heatstroke.

Another man, aged about 40 and unidentified so far, was found dead at Bhati Chowk. The police said injuries on the body suggested that he might have been hit by some vehicle.