India suspends rail service to Pakistan: ministry

Posted 12 30 2007 1:15AM

NEW DELHI (AFP) - New Delhi has suspended two train services to Pakistan following violence in the wake of the assassination of former premier Benazir Bhutto, the railways ministry said.

Two trains were "cancelled on security considerations with immediate effect until further notice," the ministry said in a statement late Friday.

The "Samjhauta (friendship) Express" runs between New Delhi and the eastern Pakistani city of Lahore.

The "Thar Express" -- named after a desert -- connects India's Jodhpur city to the Pakistani town of Khokrapar and was reopened in 2006 after a gap of four decades to improve relations between the people of the rival nations.

In February, 68 people, mostly Pakistani holiday-makers, were killed in a bomb blast on the "Samjhauta Express" in north India.

The blast was blamed on Islamic terrorists seeking to derail a slow-moving peace dialogue between nuclear-armed India and Pakistan.

Bhutto died on Thursday after a suicide attack targetting her vehicle at a campaign rally in the northern Pakistani city of Rawalpindi. Early reports said she had been shot before a bomb exploded nearby.

Her death triggered a wave of violence throughout Pakistan by angry and grief-stricken supporters which has left at least 33 people dead.