In so doing, the militants added Karachi, the country's largest city, a major port and the financial center, and Muzaffarabad, capital of Pakistan-controlled Kashmir province, to its list of targeted cities for spreading mayhem.

Prior to that, Karachi and Muzaffarabad had been spared the worst of the violence of the past four months in which hundreds have died, with civilians from all walks of life taking the brunt.

The Karachi and Muzaffarabad attacks were purely sectarian in that they were aimed at the Shiites, who account for about 20 percent of the 174 million population in Sunni-majority Pakistan.

What was especially tragic in the two incidents was that the killers chose to attack their victims during the holy month of Muharram when Shiites take out religious processions to mourn the death of their 7th century Imam Hussein, who died in the Iraqi city of Karbala. At least 10 died in the Dec. 27 Muzaffarabad attack and 43 in the Dec. 28 Karachi bombing, and scores more were injured.

Sectarian violence is not uncommon in Pakistan, but the fact that the latest incidents occurred in the current violence-ridden environment made authorities even more concerned and pointed to how far the insurgency has spread in the country from the militants' sanctuaries in the tribal regions.

In the Muzaffarabad blast, authorities said the attacker blew himself up when stopped by security guards. The BBC reported the militants have also used Muzaffarabad to set up camps for their groups to launch attacks against the Indian army on the Indian side of Kashmir.

In the Karachi blast, the attacker or attackers reportedly succeeded in blending with others in the procession despite heavy security.

As people turned their anger against authorities following the attacks, Karachi Mayor Mustafa Kamal urged them not to clash with police and doctors, saying "that is what terrorists are aiming at," Britain's Daily Telegraph reported.

Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari said the extremists are trying "to turn the fight against militants into a sectarian clash and make the people fight against one another," The New York Times reported.

Pakistan's Dawn newspaper said losses from the Karachi blast, which occurred near a large wholesale market area, were estimated at about $350 million. The report said fires resulting from the blast and subsequent rioting gutted about 3,000 shops in the area, idling about 10,000 employees. Many of the shops destroyed by the fire were not insured, the report said.

The attack on the Shiites was seen as another tactic by the militants to further weaken the embattled Zardari government and disrupt the military's counterinsurgency offensive in South Waziristan.

Talat Masood, a former army general and currently a security analyst, told The New York Times the Karachi blast was likely the work of Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, a group with links to al-Qaida and the Pakistan Taliban with past involvement in sectarian violence.

"The Taliban and the jihadi elements are very much opposed to Shiites, and this suits their double purpose of destabilizing the state while creating despondency amongst the people, and especially the Shiite," Masood said.

Early reports said the Taliban had claimed responsibility for the Karachi attack. But two days later Azam Tariq, a spokesman for the Pakistan Taliban, said the group had no involvement, Dawn reported.

Tariq also was quoted as saying the earlier claim of Taliban responsibility made by militant commander Azmatullah Shaheen was baseless and that Shaheen had "acted on his own will."

Separately, Pakistan's Daily News reported that Tariq, speaking to the newspaper on telephone from an undisclosed location, said Shaheen's claim may have referred to his own group.

In a Dec. 30 editorial, Dawn said: "No one can say with certainty whether Monday's attack was motivated solely by sectarian hatred or if it is part of the wider menace of Taliban-inspired terrorism. Many seem inclined towards the latter view, arguing that the blast was aimed at provoking sectarian strife and opening up a new front to further destabilize a country that is already at war. It could also be part of the general campaign to raise fear levels to a point where the public starts questioning the wisdom of the army crackdown on militancy."

Whatever their motivation, the militants struck again last Friday, just days after the Karachi killings. The target this time was a sports field in the town of Lakki Marwat in northwest Pakistan, where a suicide bomber driving an explosives-laden vehicle set off a blast while a volleyball game was in progress. At last count, the death toll had risen to nearly 100.

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