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Up to 20 insurgents assaulted the base from several sides, blowing up sensitive aircraft including a US-manufactured surveillance plane Pakistani commandos continued to battle with heavily armed militants at a naval airbase in Karachi early on Monday after ten hours of fighting triggered by a Taliban assault to avenge the death of Osama bin Laden. Blasts rang out after dawn as the military stepped up its counter-attack on insurgents inside the PNS Mehran base, just off one of the Karachi’s busiest roads. Late Sunday night up to 20 insurgents assaulted the base from several sides, blowing up sensitive aircraft including a US-manufactured surveillance plane and killing at least five people. Television images showed flames and a plume of thick smoke billowing from the base as aircraft took fire, while bursts of gunfire and explosions rang out across the city, frightening residents. A Pakistani Taliban spokesman claimed responsibility. “It was the revenge of martyrdom of Osama bin Laden. It was the proof that we are still united and powerful,” Ehsanullah Ehsan told Reuters by telephone from an undisclosed location. The daring assault was a fresh embarrassment for the Pakistani military, three weeks after US Navy Seals travelling on five helicopters breached the country’s air defences to carry out the raid that killed Osama bin Laden. The Taliban have not attacked such a sensitive facility since the February 2009 Taliban assault on army headquarters in Rawalpindi. The interior minister, Rehman Malik, said the militants attacked from the rear of the base at around 10.30 on Sunday night. The headed immediately for the aircraft hangers, where they destroyed two planes and a helicopter including an American Orion P-3C maritime surveillance plane, which Pakistan had received just last year. A jet fuel tanker also exploded. “They were carrying guns, rocket-propelled grenades (RPG) and hand grenades. They hit the aircraft with an RPG,” Navy spokesman Commander Salman Ali said. Pakistani Special Services Group (SSG) commandos were dispatched to the base, supported by helicopters, triggering intense exchanges of gunfire that rang out across the city. Fighting continued through the night with a fresh round of explosions in the early morning – eight in the space of thirty minutes – as commandos reportedly flung grenades tried to storm a hanger where the Taliban were holed up. Four people were killed including three firefighters and one naval officer. Reports were unclear but up to five militants are thought to have been killed. There were unconfirmed reports that a foreigner, possibly a Chinese national, had been taken hostage. The US embassy said no Americans were present. “We have been able to confine them to one building and an operation is underway either to kill or capture them,” said Malik. Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani condemned the attack as a “cowardly act of terror”. Ehsanullah, the Taliban spokesman, said the attackers had plentiful stocks of ammunition and food. “They can fight and survive for three days,” he said. Pakistan Taliban Osama bin Laden Declan Walsh guardian.co.uk