Hotel rubble scoured after bombing

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The UN described the incident at the Pearl Continental hotel in Peshawar - which saw three attackers shoot their way past guards and then set off the explosion - as a "heinous terrorist attack".

No group has yet said it was behind the incident, but the blast followed Taliban threats to carry out major attacks in large cities to avenge an army offensive against insurgents in the nearby Swat Valley.

The attack reduced a section of the hotel to concrete rubble and twisted steel and left a huge crater in the ground outside.

Senior police official Safwat Ghayur said counter-terrorism experts, police and intelligence agents are now combing the rubble for clues into who was responsible.

The Pearl Continental, affectionately called the "PC" by Pakistanis, is the ritziest hotel in the city and is relatively well-guarded. It is positioned near government buildings.

Citing witness accounts, police said the three men were in a truck which approached the hotel's main gate. They opened fire at security guards, rushed inside and detonated more than half a ton of explosives close to the building.

The Foreign Office said the Briton is receiving hospital treatment. A spokesman added: "We can confirm that one British man has been injured. We are offering consular assistance."

A number of aid workers are among the dead. The UN named one of them as Aleksandar Vorkapic, 44, an information technology specialist from Belgrade, Serbia, who was part of an emergency team from the office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees.