Pakistan president's aide among 3 killed in blast

A bomb targeting one of Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari's senior personal security officers killed at least three people in Karachi on Wednesday, police said. The blast came in the middle-class Guru Mandar neighbourhood of central Karachi, close to an office of Zardari's Pakistan People's Party, which rules southern Sindh province. "It was a bomb blast and at least three people were killed and 10 others were wounded," senior police official Tahir Naveed told AFP. Another police official, Usman Bajwa, said Bilal Sheikh, Zardari's top personal security officer in Karachi, was among those killed in the bombing. "I can confirm that Bilal Sheikh has expired," Bajwa told AFP. Naveed said the bomb was so powerful that it shattered the bulletproof vehicle in which Sheikh was travelling. Zardari and Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif "strongly condemned" the attack, state media said.