KARACHI, Oct 17: The Pakistan Post Office has decided that from now on all parcels and letters will be opened at the counters of the booking offices.

High-ranking officials of the PPO told Dawn that after the explosion of parcel bombs in the heart of the city the postal authorities had issued instructions to all the post offices that no letters and parcels would be accepted unless the senders opened the articles on the counters.

“The articles will be afterwards repacked and retaped. The postal authorities realize that this process will be both cumbersome and time- consuming but it is being employed to facilitate both the senders and the receivers of the mail,” they explained.

They disclosed that the postal authorities handed over three suspicious-looking parcels received from New Town and Federal B. Area to the law-enforcement agencies.

“The officials of the PPO were not positive that those parcels contained bombs but they looked like those parcels which had been used by terrorists on Wednesday,” they added.

Three parcel bombs exploded at various government offices on Wednesday resulting in injuries to many people.

The PPO officials conceded that since local booking offices were in hundreds in the entire southern circle, safety devices could not be installed at all the post offices.

They said that delivery of parcels had stopped after the bomb explosions in the city. “The top hierarchy of the PPO was busy in a conference in Islamabad. It was only when some high-ranking officials reached Karachi that the process of parcel delivery resumed.”

They recalled that it was after a very long time that the post offices had been used for terrorist activities.

“After the US bombing of Afghanistan, the post offices came under attack with the outbreak of anthrax.”