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Lashkar-e-Jhangvi masterminded Quetta attack
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A TIP-OFF FROM THE INVESTIGATING teams in Balochistan trying to get to the terrorist group behind the July 4 gruesome sectarian attack in Quetta, the Sindh police is looking for a certain Sanaullah who it claims now heads the Akram Lahori faction of the banned Deobandi-sectarian terrorist organisation, Lashkar-e Jhangvi. The attack, that killed 53 Hazara Shia and left over 100 injured, is the worst single incident of sectarian violence in Pakistanâs history and came within less than a month of another attack which killed 19 Shia Hazara police recruits. Police sources confirmed to TFT that Sanaullah now leads the Lahori faction of LJ. âWe are quite certain of his involvement in the Quetta incident. Intelligence reports say he is in Karachi,â an intelligence official told TFT.
| Karachi remains Terror Central... |
Apparently, Sanaullah was among the 21 LJ and other militants that were hiding in Afghanistan and who the former Taliban government refused to hand over to Pakistan after Islamabad gave Kabul a list of terrorists and miscreants. Top of the list was LJ chief, Riaz Basra. Basra was killed in an encounter in the Punjab last year when he sneaked into Pakistan following the ouster of the Taliban government. Some others on the list — most of them wanted and carrying head money — included Basraâs deputy Zakiullah, Muhammad Ajmal alias Akram Lahori, Muhammad Aslam Muawia, Tariq Mehmood, Shakeel Ahmad, Javed Ahmad, Rustam Ali Khan, Muhammad Tanveer Khan, Abdul Aziz, alias Katona, Ghulam Shabbir, alias Fauji, Amanat Ali, Dilawar Hussain, Hafiz Mazhar Iqbal, Shabbir Ahmad, Ihsanullah, Asghar Ali, Shafiq, Qari Asad, Akhtar Muawia and Qari Saifullah Akhtar.
| A rogues' gallery of beturbanned ruffians... |
The Taliban government had provided shelter to a number of sectarian and jihadi militants on their soil and told Islamabad to stop pressing the point. They [Taliban] denied these persons had taken refuge in Afghanistan. The Pakistani government remained unconvinced. But most of these sectarian criminals had to sneak back into Pakistan after the Talibanâs rout at the hands of the US-led allied troops and the capture of Kabul by the anti-Taliban Northern Alliance.
| Otherwise they'd have been tossed into jug and the Pak gummint would have bitched and moaned until the Afghans released them... |
An official in Karachi told TFT these terrorists would enter Pakistan, mount attacks on the Shias and indulge in other criminal activities before going back to Afghanistan. âThey used different entry and exit points every time and were involved in bank robberies and sectarian-related killings. We now know that these terrorists also pulled the Bahawalpur bank robbery a couple of years ago,â he said. According to police reports at the time, armed men had robbed the bank of Rs8 million. Says another police officer of their modus operandi: âAfter entering Pakistan they would disperse to engage targets in various parts of the country as per their plan. This is why when we finally got to the leaders, Riaz Basra was killed and Aslam Muawia arrested from the Punjab while Akram Lahori and Qari Asad were arrested from Karachi.â Police sources say the LJ factions led by Akram Lahori and Asif Ramzi have not yet lost their strength despite Lahoriâs arrest and Ramziâs mysterious death some time ago in a blast at a chemical warehouse in Karachiâs Korangi suburb. âWe have information that they are regrouping and getting new recruits from the smaller towns and rural areas across Pakistan,â says an intelligence official.
| Enticing the rustics with gaudy turbans and tales of the depravity of the infidels they've never seen... |
Investigators are also seriously investigating two blasts in five days in two major Sindh cities and their possible link to the Quetta carnage. At least two people were killed and many others were injured when a time bomb went off at the entrance of Kawish Crown Plaza, which is believed to be owned by the underworld don Dawood Ibrahim. Ibrahim is wanted by India in connection with the 1993 Bombay blasts which killed more than 200 people.
Posted by: Paul Moloney 2003-07-25 |
