Bomb blasts hit shops, policeman killed

Suspected militants blew up six music shops in restive north-west, while a policeman was killed in a resulting gun battle with the rebels, officials said on Thursday. Militants also targeted a hair salon in a conservative district of North West Frontier Province, seriously injuring a barber in the bomb blast, a police official said.
The tribal policeman was killed in a village after militants blew up three music shops deemed un-Islamic and traded fire with police late Wednesday, police official Mukarram Khan told AFP. Another policeman was hurt and a militant injured during the gunfight was captured, he said. Early Thursday two blasts rocked a town damaging three more music shops and the hair salon, police official Azhar Ali told AFP.
The barber, who lost both his hands in the explosion, was taken to hospital in a serious condition, the official said. Police defused a third home-made bomb fitted with a timer which was planted under an electricity transformer in the area, he said.