September 22, 2008	Monday	Ramazan 21, 1429

ISLAMABAD, Sept 21: Czech Ambassador to Pakistan Ivo Zdarek, two Americans and a Vietnamese woman were among the 53 people killed in the suicide bomb attack on the Marriott Hotel in Islamabad on Saturday evening.

(The US Department of Defence at Pentagon has confirmed the deaths of its two marines in Saturday blast. According to a private news TV channel, the Pentagon said that the soldiers were deployed in the US embassy in Islamabad.—APP)

Three bodies lying in the mortuary of the Pims hospital are charred beyond recognition.

More than 250 people, including foreigners, were injured. Of them, 106 were taken to the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences hospital (Pims) and 40 were there till Sunday evening.

Hospital spokesman said that 38 bodies, including four of the foreigners, two of Frontier Constabulary personnel, six of hotel security guards and one of a woman passerby had been brought to hospital.

Five bodies and 114 injured were taken to the Polyclinic hospital, six bodies and 18 injured to the CDA hospital and 15 injured, five of them foreigners, to the Al-Shifa hospital.

The death toll may rise as some of the injured were in critical condition.

According to sources, under the security plan prepared for Saturday, five police mobile vans had been deployed to patrol the area.

But a mobile van carrying police commandos on patrol around the hotel was removed at 4:15 pm.

The security division was repeatedly informed by the police control room that there was no patrol van outside the hotel.

The sources said that it was a traffic police official who noticed a recklessly driven dumper moving towards the Marriott Hotel.

He tried to inform the traffic control about the truck but the explosion took place drowning his voice for ever.

The bodies of the Czech ambassador and Vietnamese woman who were among the foreigners killed have been put in the Rawalpindi Medical College morgue, a spokesman for the Pims hospital said.

He said the body of the Czech envoy would be handed over to the Czech authorities on Monday.

Besides the Vietnamese national, a Pakistani woman security guard were among the killed.

The body of one US national has been handed over to the US authorities while the second body would be handed over on Monday.