ARMED separatists have stormed the Chinese Consulate in the Pakistan city of Karachi.

The incident triggered an hour-long shootout in which two police officers, two citizens and all three assailants were killed.

The Pakistani civilians killed were a father and a son had come to the consulate to pick up their visas to China, police said.

Elsewhere in Pakistan yesterday, a powerful bomb at an open-air food market in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province killed 35 people.