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Militants blow up 2 dozen music shops in Kohat, Miranshah

<>* Attacks injure four in Kohat
* Militants in Miranshah had issued a one-week deadline to shopkeepers to stop selling images, music

PESHAWAR: Bombs ripped through several music and video shops in northwestern Pakistan on Wednesday, wounding at least four people, officials said.

The injuries occurred when a blast hit a video shop located on the 2nd floor of Bannu Market in main Bazaar of the garrison town of Kohat, which has seen several attacks in recent months blamed on Pakistani Taliban militants.

“The bomb was planted in a CD and video shop, resulting in the wounding of at least three people. The shop was destroyed and some nearby shops were also damaged,” local police official Shakirullah, who goes by one name, told AFP. There was no immediate claim of responsibility.

Miranshah: Separately, bombs destroyed two dozen businesses, including around eight music shops in Purani Ghari Mandi in Miranshah, the capital town in the North Waziristan, officials and residents said.

The attack came overnight, at the end of a one-week deadline issued by militants in the town near the Afghan border for shopkeepers to close outlets showing still and moving images, or selling music.

“We received a letter one week ago from the Taliban that we must close down our business and not sell any music, videos or photos,” shop owner Inayatullah Khan told AFP. “Now they have carried out their threat and left us without our business.”No one was hurt in the attack, according to the sources.

“About 25 masked militants came at about 1:30am, planted explosives and blew up the entire market,” said Mohammad Sakhi, who runs a workshop next to the market. The stalls offered pirated Indian and Hollywood films as well as CDs of Pashtun folk music. Some kept more racy movies under the counter, a resident said.

There have been numerous attacks on video and music shops in remote northwestern border regions by militants who see all music, film and television as un-Islamic. Last year, hardline religious students from a mosque even tried to press video shops to close in the capital, Islamabad. agencies

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