About 12 hours after storming Pakistan navy's key airbase in the heart of the port city of Karachi, heavily-armed Taliban militants were still holding onto parts of the base after destroying two US-made surveillance aircraft and killing 12 military personnel.
Pakistan army's elite Special Service Group (SSG) and naval commandos backed by helicopters were hunting down a group of 15-20 militants who attacked the naval premises last night in the worst assault on a military base since the Army Headquarters was besieged in October 2009 in Rawalpindi.
Security forces were engaged in a deadly gunbattle with armed militants since last night after the militants sneaked into the PNS Mehran, the naval air station within Faisal airbase, from three residential points adjacent to the air base.
Fifteen loud explosions were heard from the base, the headquarters of Pakistan's naval air arm, following the attack and intermittent firing was reported till this morning.
The security forces also killed four militants and have captured four alive, a senior security official said.
Interior minister Rehman Malik, who was dispatched to Karachi by Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani to monitor the situation, said the terrorists entered the airbase from three directions.
"A building in the premises is still under their control from where they are exchanging fire with soldiers," he said as the militants blew up two US supplied PC-3 Orion long-range maritime reconnaissance aircraft.
"The situation is being tackled delicately to secure assets, minimise human losses and defeat the terrorists completely," he said, adding, "It is not just an attack on a navy establishment, it is an attack on Pakistan."
Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan, which has stepped up attacks on security installations since the May 2 death of Osama bin Laden, has claimed responsibility for the assault.
"We had already warned after Osama's martyrdom that we will carry out even bigger attacks," Taliban spokesman Ehsanullah Ehsan told foreign agencies from an undisclosed location in northwest Pakistan.
He said the attackers sent into PNS Mehran naval base had enough supplies to survive a three-day siege.
"They have destroyed two P-3c Orion aircraft," another Navy spokesman Commander Salman Ali said. The long-range reconnaissance aircraft were bought from the US by Pakistan.
Hundreds of security personnel, including from the paramilitary Pakistan Rangers and elite naval and army commandos, moved into the airbase to flush out the terrorists.
Authorities used helicopters throughout the night to mount surveillance over the airbase.
Heavy exchanges of fire between the attackers and terrorists continued till about 11.30 pm last night, and was then followed by intermittent firing and 15 blasts after midnight.
"The operation still continues. It is not over yet," said one security official. The cordon around the attackers was being tightened and the operation was likely to be completed soon, he said.
The terrorists targeted several hangars where the navy's P3C Orion surveillance aircraft were parked.
Footage on television overnight showed ambulances rushing to the airbase.
Flames and thick smoke billowed into the sky from an object burning near a four-engine aircraft that looked like a P3C Orion.
The high-security area where the attack occurred also houses the PAF's Southern Air Command, Air War College and museum.
Security was tightened across Pakistan following the attack, particularly at military installations and in the federal and provincial capitals.
President Asif Ali Zardari and Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani strongly condemned the terrorist attack. Gilani said such "cowardly acts of terror could not deter the commitment of the government and people of Pakistan to fight terrorism".
Defence and political analysts termed the attack by the militants as a big security lapse by the Naval forces that needed to be investigated thoroughly.
Head of Pakistan Navy Vice Admiral Noman Bashir said the country's armed forces would continue their fight against terrorists.
Security sources said that the terrorists apparently entered the Naval Mehran air station adjacent to the Pakistan Airforce Faisal base on the main Shahrah-e-Faisal road through three different routes dressed in military uniforms.
"They took advantage of the fact that people at that time were leaving for home from the PAF museum inside the Faisal base," one source said.
Sources said that some Chinese engineers were also working at the naval base where the attack took place but they were evacuated safely.
"The air station was basically used as an operational and surveillance centre with a runaway and hangers by the naval aircrafts and also had a training centre," provincial government official Ahmed Chinoy said.
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