 | This is the tie-breaker for Emily's WakiPaki Irredenta contest. |
FAISALABAD: A group of armed men led by a man claiming to be the Imam Mehdi
| Last week he was Elvis. The week before he was Napoleon Bonapart. |
hijacked a bus on the Motorway and demanded to speak to President Gen Pervez Musharraf on Thursday.
| "Perv! We wanna talk to Perv!" |
They later surrendered and gave up the hostages after the police arrested their leader,
but not before a man was killed and three injured in a shootout.
| Must not have been the real Imam Mehdi since he didn't use his mind-ray. |
| He did, but it only melted part of the police car. |
Senior Faisalabad police officials said that at around 12:30pm on Thursday, 35 to 40 armed men wearing orange uniforms came to an anti-narcotics police station at Allied Chowk in two cars, one pickup van and a motorcycle, all equipped with loudspeakers.
| Then the motorcycle got the cord to the loudspeaker caught in the chain... |
They started airing a message over the loudspeakers: âOur leader Shahbaz Khan is Imam Mehdi and heâll grace the world at 4pm after a severe earthquake. All Muslims are directed to immediately contact him.â
The men proceeded to drive around while playing the message, and also fired bullets in the air, one of which hit a passer-by, Muhammad Younas, in the leg.
| If they were firing bullets into the air, does that mean Muhammad was flying over them at the time? |
| We don't have a pic of circus clowns in a little car, but it seems appropriate here. |
A police team started chasing them,
and were later joined by police from Jhang, Toba Tek Singh, Chiniot, and Pindi Bhattian.
| "Calling all cars! Be on the lookout for Imam Mehdi! That is all!" |
The police surrounded the men near Kamalpur Interchange, where the men were beating up motorway staff.
| "Drop the bludgeon, Muggsy! We gotcha surrounded!" |
When they saw the police, they stopped a bus going to Lahore with 40 passengers and held it hostage. There was then a crossfire shootout in which four of the men â Sharif, Sheikh Tahir and Naveed â were injured.
Sharif later died in hospital.
| Wonder if his mother knew he was an apostate? |
Shahbaz Khan announced his message again and demanded a meeting with senior federal authorities and the international press.
| "Oh, yeah? Where's the earthquake?" |
Police said the men initially claimed to be from the Anjuman Sarfroshan-e-Islam sect, but later claimed they belonged to a ânew religionâ, Deen-e-Younas.
| Rut-roh, better not let the Bugtis hear about this. |
The police convinced Shahbaz that they were going to take him to meet journalists, but arrested him instead.
| "Yeah! We're gonna take you to meet some nice journalists... right over... here! Get 'im, boys!" |
His accomplices then surrendered. A total of 29 men, including Shahbaz, were arrested and Nishatabad police registered cases against them under sections of the Pakistan Penal Code and the Anti-Terrorism Act.
Police seized 12 7mm rifles, one double barrel rifle, nine pistols, one dagger and bullets from them. |