Taliban claim responsibility for Pakistan's Karachi airport attack

Taliban gunmen disguised as police guards attacked a terminal at Pakistan's busiest airport yesterday with machine-guns and a rocket launcher during a five-hour siege, officials said.

It is as yet unclear how many were killed - reports vary between 18 and 24 fatalities.

The army secured control in the early hours of this morning, although further gunfire and a explosion were heard later on.

Pakistani Taliban claimed responsibility and said the attack was revenge for army air strikes along the Afghan border where its insurgents are based.

"We carried out this attack on the Karachi airport and it is a message to the Pakistani government that we are still alive to react over the killings of innocent people in bomb attacks on their villages," said Shahidullah Shahid, spokesman for the Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan, or TTP, Dawn reports.

The spokesman for the Pakistani military, Gen. Asim Bajwa, said on Twitter that no aircraft were damaged and that as a precautionary measure, security forces were sweeping the airport before operations would be returned to the Civil Aviation Authority and airport police.