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| India-Pakistan | |
| More on the raids in Lahore | |
| 2004-01-13 | |
| The intelligence agencies, probing into two suicide bombing attacks on Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf, accompanied by police officials conducted more raids in various localities in the provincial metropolis and arrested nine persons on suspicion of their involvement in the attacks. âWe were directed by authorities in Islamabad to raid two seminaries of Al-Hafiz Town, Hanjerwal area, and nine persons were taken into custodyâ, said an official who took part in the raids, adding though they belong to religious organisation yet they donât have any connection with the extremist outfits. He said while in police custody, they were thoroughly interrogated by the personnel of intelligence agencies. âThey seem to be innocent and have no connection of any sort with the assassination attempt on Musharraf,â he said. Interestingly enough, when this scribe contacted Provincial Police Officer Syed Masud Shah on his cell phone to ascertain details of the raids from him, Shah switched off his phone after listening to the detailed query. The sources say after the Rawalpindi police arrested a religious extremist namely Jamil in connection with assassination attempt he gave them a lead about the involvement of Habibullah - Amir of Harkatul Jehad Islami Burma chapter. The investigators suspect that Habibullah might have masterminded the suicide attacks on President Pervez Musharraf. DSP Rawalpindi Rana Shahid raided a seminary in Tara Garh in district Kasur late Friday night and took into custody a teacher namely Habibullah. âHabibullah belongs to a banned extremist religious organisation and has participated in Afghan Jehadâ, the sources say. The administrator of the seminary, Qari Abdul Karim, said that 16 students are getting religious education here and Qari Masud had referred him Habibullah, a resident of Rajgarh in Islampura. Habibullah is married with two wives and has five children. He currently has been living in a three-room house constructed on the first floor of the seminary. The sources claim that the raiding team, got a picture of a suspected namely Ihsan whom they blame for attacks on President Pervez Musharraf. âIhsan is wanted in Bahawalpur Church attacks and he had allegedly faxed the messages to various newspapers offices fixing the responsibility of attacks on Jaish-i-Muhammad. The fax message also include the name of Bilal,â sources say, adding that the whereabouts of both Bilal and Ihsan are still unknown. All those picked during raids were shown the picture of Ihsan for identification but none of them recognised him. The police also took into custody three brothers namely Rizwan, Sulaiman and Usman from Masjid-i-Ibrahimi during the raids. However, the investigators released Sulaiman and Usman after a few hours interrogation but Rizwan is still in custody. âThe investigators kept asking the whereabouts of Harkatul Jehad Islami, Burma Chapter Amir, Habibullah, for almost two hours from the three brothers. But we donât know who Habibullah is,â sources told quoting the family members of the three brother. The sources say that the policemen were kept in dark till the raids were conducted, adding that some officials of intelligence agencies from Islamabad led the raiding party.
When contacted Interior Minister Syed Faisal Saleh Hayat said that those involved in assassination bid on the President have already been identified. âThe raids are conducted at the information provided by the intelligence agencies and it takes time to elicit information from the arrested peoples,â the Minister said. | |
| Posted by:Dan Darling |