Records fall as rains drop on Palaro

PESHAWAR (AFP) - Pakistan's government has formed a team to investigate a suicide blast that targeted and injured the country's interior minister and killed 28 others, officials said Sunday. 

The minister, Aftab Sherpao, had just addressed a public gathering Saturday in the town of Charsada in North West Frontier Province, which borders Afghanistan, when the bomber rushed towards the stage and detonated his explosives. 

"We have formed a joint investigation team comprising provincial and federal police and investigation agencies to probe the incident," the province's chief minister, Akram Durrani, told reporters after meeting Sherpao. 

Sherpao, a staunch supporter of President Pervez Musharraf, has talked prominently of the government's achievements in fighting terrorism. Pakistan is a key ally of the United States in its so-called "war on terror."