Police have arrested a close aide of a senior Pakistani al-Qaida operative who used to run a terror training camp in Afghanistan and was recently captured in the United Arab Emirates, an official said Thursday. The aide, identified only as Arshad, was arrested in a raid late Monday on a hideout in Sialkot, a city about 80 miles northwest of Lahore in eastern Pakistan, said Sialkot police chief Nisar Saroya. He said two of Arshad's associates escaped. Police seized 12 rockets, three rocket launchers, two AK-47 assault rifles, three pistols and ammunition.
| The usual religious artifacts. |
Arshad is believed to be a close aide of Qari Saifullah Akhtar who used to run a terror camp near the Afghan capital Kabul that trained 3,500 men in combat skills, including assassination and kidnapping. The Rishkhor camp was visited by Osama bin Laden and Taliban chief Mullah Mohammed Omar. Akhtar disappeared just before the U.S. bombing of Afghanistan in October 2001 that led to the ouster of the Taliban regime. He was arrested recently in Dubai, and Pakistani officials at the weekend that he had been flown to Pakistan for questioning. It wasn't immediately clear if the suspects arrested Monday had been planning to carry out any attack. "I can't disclose their plans until investigations are completed," Saroya told The Associated Press. Arshad is also suspected of links with two militant organizations - Harkat-e-Jihad-e-Islami and Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, an al-Qaida-linked Sunni Muslim organization blamed for involvement in the killing of minority Shiite Muslims. Arshad, who had trained in Afghanistan, was wanted in the killings of 13 Shiites in attacks in various parts of Pakistan, Saroya said. It was unclear when those attacks had occurred. |