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PESHAWAR, Pakistan - A car bomb killed three people in northwestern Pakistan Friday, despite calls from Taliban leaders asking Islamic militants to refrain from attacks amid efforts by the new government to reach peace deals in the region.A spokesman for Pakistani Taliban militants claimed responsibility for the blast but said it did not damage their commitment to peace negotiations opened by the government. The bomb, which shattered a five-week lull in violence, went off between a police station and a market area in the city of Mardan at 6 a.m. local time, senior police official Akhbar Ali Shah said.Javed Khan, a city police official, said one police officer as well as the owner of a small restaurant and one his staff were killed. Twenty-six people were injured, including 18 policemen.It was the first major bombing since Pakistan's new government took office and pledged to scale back military operations against militants. The last deadly blast was a suicide attack that killed five soldiers in the South Waziristan region on March 20.The government, led by the party of slain former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, has vowed to negotiate with militants who renounce violence and sought to distance itself from the strong-arm tactics of U.S.-backed President Pervez Musharraf, whose influence is fading.Maulvi Umar, spokesman for an umbrella group called Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, said its militants carried out the attack to avenge the death of an associate called Hafiz Saidul Haq. Umar said police shot and killed Haq about 10 days ago when he came to Mardan for his brother's wedding.The umbrella group distributed fliers earlier this week urging its followers to observe a cease-fire to give peace talks a chance. Umar said the decision to avenge Haq's death was made before the calls to abstain from violence."We have a cease-fire with the government. But wherever the government will take action against us and will kill our friends, we will take revenge," Umar told an Associated Press reporter by telephone from an undisclosed location."We have not reached a final stage yet. We have given a positive response. The negotiations are ongoing," he said.Mohammad Adeel, a leader of a party in the new government, also said the blast would not derail the talks. The government insists it will only talk to groups who renounce violence."Even in the peace talks these things happen. Even after the agreement some people will come and they will break the agreement but we will be very patient," Adeel said.He said he couldn't predict "how many days, how many weeks or how many months" it would take to reach an agreement.Zahid Khan, like Adeel a leader of the Awami National Party, said Thursday that government envoys were in peace talks with elders of the Mahsud tribe in South Waziristan, a militant stronghold.The tribe includes Baitullah Mehsud, the leader of Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan.The fliers distributed in its name warned those who disobeyed the order would be "strung upside down in public and punished."Umar has said militants across the region were ready for peace if the government met their demands to withdraw the army and release militant prisoners. But he has also insisted they will continue to attack U.S. forces in neighboring Afghanistan.Mehsud is wanted for a string of suicide attacks in Pakistan, and the previous government has accused him of Bhutto's assassination in December. He has reportedly denied involvement.U.S. officials have voiced some support for the government's peace initiative, while urging it to exclude Taliban and al-Qaida figures suspected of orchestrating attacks in Afghanistan and Pakistan — and perhaps plotting major terrorist attacks in the West.The U.S. government, which has given Pakistan billions of dollars in return for its help in its war on terror, has expressed concern that militants have taken advantage of past peace deals to regroup.As in the days of Noah....
