But Egyptian authorities say the violence was a result of the government crackdown on a small militant cell it says carried out the 7 April suicide bombing.How is the Egyptian government dealing with the crisis?The Egyptian Prime Minister, Ahmed Nazif, is trying to play down fears that the attacks mark a return to the violence that plagued the country during a bloody campaign by Islamist extremists in the 1990s. Many members of Islamist militant groups remain in jail despite the declaration of a truce with the government in 1997.The Abdullah Azzam Brigades says Saturday’s violence was revenge for the arrests of thousands of people in Sinai after bombings at two resorts there killed 34 people last October. Rescue workers were sifting the rubble for about a dozen others feared trapped inside.
The three-story building in Lahore, that also housed workers’ quarters and apartments, collapsed in the blast.The city police chief Aftab Cheema said it was not immediately clear what triggered the explosion. Survivors, some in critical condition, said that gas cylinders had been stored in the building’s basement.Cheema said eight of the 25 people killed were from the same family, who were sleeping in an apartment on the building’s second story.Three or four nearby homes and several vehicles were damaged.Mohammed Afzal, the official in charge of the rescue operation, said the blast was heard around Lahore, the main city in eastern Pakistan.”We have been told that dozens of people were inside the building at the time of the blast. Domestic frustrations are also a likely factor.A spokesmen for the opposition Al-Ghad party said the violence was the result of an “environment of oppression and depression”, a reference to the emergency laws the country has lived under since 1981.

Police are still hunting for Yassin’s brother Mohammed, who was present when Yassin’s wife and sister later opened fire on a tour bus.The three have been linked by police to a man who killed three tourists and himself in a nail bombing at a Cairo bazaar in April.Two militant groups have claimed responsibility: the Mujahedin of Egypt and the al-Qa’ida-influenced Abdullah Azzam Brigades. Neither claim has been verified.Why has there been an upsurge in violence?Islamist groups in Egypt have undoubtedly been radicalised by the American occupation of Iraq and have become markedly more hostile to Westerners. We are trying to save as many people as possible,” he said.He expected it would take another four hours to clear the debris.”We are using cranes and bulldozers. We are very careful because some people are still believed buried in the rubble,” he said, as grieving relatives and residents wailed and cried for their loved ones.The building housed a small ice cream factory whose 12-15 workers usually slept on the front lawn but had stayed inside last night because of heavy rain.”First I heard a big explosion, and then saw the roof falling. I don’t know what happened next, but when I opened my eyes, I was on a hospital bed,” said one of the workers, Munib Ahmad, 25, recovering at Lahore’s Jinnah Hospital. His head was bandaged.Other survivors at the hospital said the building owner had ignored repeated requests to move the gas cylinders that were stored in the basement.”We always feared that it would happen one day,” said Sardar Ahmed, 34, who was sleeping on the second floor when the blast occurred.

“He never paid any attention to our requests.”The owner, a retired academic, could not be reached for comment.The city mayor Mian Amir Mahmood told reporters that he had ordered an investigation and that those found responsible would be punished.. Why has Cairo suddenly become so tense?

Why has Cairo suddenly become so tense?
Egyptian police have detained more than 200 people for questioning following two attacks on foreign tourists in Cairo over the weekend. Nine people, four of them foreigners, were injured.Ihab Yousri Yassin blew himself up with a nail bomb near the Egyptian Museum. But 175 other activists remain in jail.Madhav Nepal’s United Marxist-Leninist Party was a member of the coalition that was dismissed by the King. Sher Bahadur Deuba, the Prime Minister, who was dismissed, was released before Mr Nepal, but has since been re-arrested after refusing to testify before an anti-corruption board. Most observers agree the board is a thinly disguised attempt by the King to discredit his political opponents.King Gyanendra has come under pressure from foreign backers to re-democratise the country. The United States and Britain recalled their ambassadors, while Britain and India have suspended military aid..