By Anthony Paul, Senior Writer

THE success of the attack on Islamabad's Marriott Hotel must be on the minds of every building security officer in Asia.

I have stayed often at the hotel and one good reason for that is the elaborate steps the hotel took to make terrorists look for an easier target.

A wall and nature strip separated the main building from the approach road. Two heavy metal barriers blocked entry to all vehicles until they were checked inside and underneath by armed guards.

Armed guards also stood at the main entrance operating an airport-style X-ray machine, vetting anyone trying to walk into the lobby

Despite all this, at least two previous attacks were made on the hotel.

In October 2004, I stayed at the Marriott during a visit to Islamabad to interview Pakistan's then President Pervez Musharraf for The Straits Times. Several hours after I had left for the airport, a bomb exploded near that X-ray machine, wounding at least seven people.

In January last year, a suicide bomber tried to enter the hotel via a side gate. When a guard stopped him, the bomber blew himself up, killing the guard as well.

The Marriott stands in the heart of official Islamabad, near embassies and the homes of senior bureaucrats, and about a kilometre from the President's downtown office and Parliament.

The hotel's restaurants and coffee shops were favourite haunts of top-level Pakistanis and resident Westerners.

There was even that increasingly rare facility in West Asia - a bar, discreetly underground, where it was possible to relax over a Scotch with a contact, provided he signed a statement that he was not a Muslim.

Until the six-storey Marriott opened late last century, there were no five-star hotels in Islamabad.

The Marriott was full-service: 258 rooms, 32 suites, an executive-club floor, many rooms offering views of the city and distant hills, and all with reliable, high-speed broadband facilities.

A range of restaurants - Japanese, Chinese, Thai and a Western steakhouse - lured wealthier Pakistanis and the capital's large diplomatic community.

A large buffet restaurant- cum-coffee shop near the reception desk was a popular gathering place for both residents and the steady stream of visiting overseas businessmen and foreign correspondents covering Pakistan's ever-worsening crisis.

A business centre open around the clock and 14 meeting rooms, a swimming pool and state-of-the art gym catered to them. A lobby kiosk offered a range of air-delivered periodicals from around the world along with the latest non-fiction best-selling books on West Asia. Carpet shops and antique stores stood in an adjoining corridor.

The attack last January indicated that terrorists were clearly still interested in the Marriott. But on my most recent visit to Islamabad - last December to January, once again for an ST interview with Mr Musharraf and some reporting on the aftermath of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto's assassination - it still made sense for me to stay there.

I took one simple precaution. In Saigon in 1975, my hotel room was on a low floor near a hotel entrance. In the hope of maximum effect, terrorists tend to aim at lobbies. Hours after I had moved to another hotel, a Viet Cong rocket attack wiped out most of the floor my room was on.

In Islamabad in December - on what, I suppose, given photos of the devastation, will prove to have been my last visit to this Marriott - I insisted on a room on a high floor at the back.

Photographs of the hotel's front rooms in flames suggested that a back room was indeed a good idea.

anthonypaul@asiahand.com

This article was first published in The Straits Times on Sept 22, 2008.


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