By Faraz Khan
KARACHI: The Sindh police’s Crime Investigation Department (CID) arrested five people associated with the banned religious outfit, Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LJ), on Wednesday.
The arrests were made after a brief encounter in Orangi Town, carried out by a CID team led by DSP Choudhry Safdar. The arrested men were identified as Shakeel Burmi, Afzal alias Rickshaw Wala, Atif alias Chooha, Wasim alias Baroodi and Nasir alias Saifullah.
Four associates of the men, namely Rasheed Swati, Arif alias Chohta, Danish and Naseer, managed to flee and raids are being carried out throughout the city for their arrest.
Suicide jackets and 150 kilogrammes of explosives were recovered from their possession. Police officials are questioning the arrested militants about their possible links with the Indian intelligence agency, RAW, as the explosives recovered from their possession bore an Indian insignia.
According to officials, all the men are residents of Karachi and have been involved in various terrorist cases. Shakeel Burmi, who is also named in the CID Red Book, is said to be the LJ commander in Karachi and was involved in various cases of target killings and sectarian violence.
“The men were trained in South Waziristan and are experts in making explosives,” said Khan, adding that Burmi had arrived in the city a week ago after meeting Qari Hussain Mehsud. Wasim Baroodi has also been involved in sectarian violence and target killings. Khan revealed that one of the men, Atif, is the brother of Rashid alias Tehseen who was involved in the bombing of Madina-tul-Ilm Imambargah in Gulshan-e-Iqbal. Atif was designated the task of attaining details about government officials.
Afzal, who was also involved in various cases of violence in the city, reportedly used his rickshaw to spy on government officials and transport explosives around the city.
“All the men are associated with LJ and Qari Hussain Mehsud, who specialises in suicide bombings and operates from Wana,” said CID (Operations) SSP Fayyaz Khan. “We have recovered 150 kilogrammes of RDX explosives that were made in India, two suicide jackets and five Kalashnikovs.” He added that they had brought the explosives from Qari Hussain Mehsud by road and that each suicide jacket contained around 20 kilogrammes of RDX. He said that their possible targets were offices of intelligence agencies, top government officials, the CID, courts, including the Sindh High Court and City Court buildings, top political and other personalities, Sindh Assembly and cadet schools and colleges.
