Police narrow down list of facilitators in Charsadda attack

PESHAWAR/ CHARSADDA: A day after militants rampaged through a state-run university in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa’s Charsadda district, law enforcement agencies narrowed down the list of suspected facilitators on Thursday as they pieced together clues following intelligence-based operations.

Terrorists killed 21 people at the Bacha Khan University on Wednesday in a vicious assault that brought back frightening memories of the shocking attack on the Army Public School in the provincial capital on December 16, 2014.



Police believe that the assailants had spent the night before the attack in Charsadda and their handlers were also in the very same district, said a senior officer. “Based on the information we have gathered, four suspects were apprehended from Shabqadar, on the border with Mohmand Agency.”

Charsadda DPO Khalid Sohail informed the media that the suspects were believed to be facilitators of the perpetrators. He said 35 people had also been arrested during search and strike operations in separate villages.

Reports were received of dozens of small-scale operations from different parts of the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province and the Federally Administered Tribal Areas.

An intelligence official said other operations were conducted in Kohat’s frontier region of Darra Adam Khel and the adjoining areas of Peshawar. The official said the identity of two of the attackers had been ascertained.

Police have announced a reward of Rs1 million for those who can help the police in pointing out the culprits behind the attack.

Meanwhile, the body of 23-year-old Muhammad Ayaz, a student of the Bacha Khan University who died at the Lady Reading Hospital (LRH) in Peshawar, was handed over to his family.

Eleven patients are still under treatment at the District Headquarters Hospital Charsadda, the Combined Military Hospital Peshawar and LRH. The hospital administrations have declared that their condition is stable.

K-P Chief Minister Pervaiz Khattak, who cut short his trip to Scotland, told the media at the university that the time had come for the federal administration to raise the issue of terrorism on an international level.

The students of the university held a demonstration against his and Maulana Fazlur Rehman’s arrival, shouting slogans against the government.

Cabinet meeting

K-P is on the frontline in the war against terrorism, the provincial government said in a statement issued after a cabinet meeting called in the wake of Wednesday’s attack.

With CM Khattak in chair, the meeting was briefed by the police chief and the home secretary about the security situation of the province after the attack.



Khattak directed the police to take action against the financers of the terrorists with the help of the Federal Investigation Agency. “The civilian government and the Pakistan Army are on the same page against the terrorists, and every possible step would be taken to eliminate terrorism.”

According to insiders, it was proposed that a police picket be built at each educational institution of the province, but the suggestion was turned down because of insufficient policemen.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 22^nd,  2016.