Hardcore militants to be moved from central jail to Malir

Overcapacity prison vulnerable to terrorist attacks, fear officials

KARACHI: Fearing the chance of more jailbreaks following the recent escape of two 'hardcore' militants, the authorities have decided to shift militants incarcerated at the Karachi Central Jail to Malir Jail, where 20 well-secured barracks are to be established this year.

The central prison houses around 6,000 inmates - twice its original capacity. There are 380 staffers, including officials and guards, temporarily being supported by three platoons of the Frontier Constabulary, each having around 40 to 45 personnel, and 50 Rangers soldiers. As per these estimates, the inmates to guard ratio is 10:1.

In Karachi the threat of a jailbreak has been looming for years and intelligence agencies have repeatedly issued warnings about these activities by terrorist groups. One such attempt was thwarted around two-and-a-half-years back when, during a raid, the Rangers discovered a tunnel being dug towards the prison.



The tunnel was being dug at a small house located north east of the jail in Ghausia Colony, which is just a narrow lane away from the outer perimeter of the prison. It is said that the two-storey house was purchased by terrorists solely for this purpose. At the time of discovery, the tunnel was five feet high, three feet wide and 45 metres-long.

The terrorists had used the water tank as it base. It was just 10 meters short of its target inside in the prison. As many as 100 hardcore militants could have been freed if the terrorists were successful, say investigators.

The attempt was reminiscent of the daring breakout in April, 2011 when the Afghan Taliban had tunnelled at least 480 inmates out of a main prison in Kandahar province of Afghanistan, whisking them through a 1,000-foot-long underground passage they had dug over the span of a few months.

On this side of the border, the Pakistani Taliban freed nearly 600 inmates - among them some high-profile Taliban fighters - in near-identical raids on the Bannu and DI Khan prisons in 2012 and 2013 respectively.



There are nearly 250 to 300 hardcore terrorists incarcerated at the central prison belonging to various militant outfits including Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan, Jaish-e-Muhammad, Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan, alQaeda, alQaeda in the Indian Subcontinent as well as Da’ish. This includes the militants who attempted to assassinate former president and then army chief General (retd) Pervez Musharraf, Omar Shaikh, who was sentenced to death for killing American journalist Daniel Pearl and Lashkar-e-Jhangvi co-founder Akram Lahori.

Senior anti-terror officers feared that the terrorist groups who failed during previous jailbreak attempts at Central Jail, Karachi and still intend to take prisoners out may have approached the fleeing under trial prisoners in an attempt to initiate a successful jailbreak. "These two fleeing terrorists could prove [useful] for those who want to break out prisoners," explained a senior anti-terror officer. "Those groups could definitely use them as they now have the expertise of a successful jailbreak, know minute details about the prison and had been a good nexus with the imprisoned terrorists."

The authorities are also planning to move the hardcore militants from central prison to other jails in order to lessen the burden. "We are planning to shift back to some of the terrorists who are from the Sukkur jail and are now imprisoned at the central jail in Karachi. We are also going to establish nearly 20 more barracks for hardcore militants at the District Jail, Malir," explained Minster for Law and Prisons Ziaul Hassan Lanjar. "No doubt, there is negligence of the jail authorities. I have asked the prisons IG to devise a new set of standard operating procedures to avoid such incidents in the future," he told The Express Tribune.



The Sindh government is also recruiting 2,000 more cops for the security of jails in the province. "This 2,000 strength will help us improve the security situations of the jails and we will try to ensure that these newly recruited jail cops would be trained by the army," the minister explained. "We are also going to make new jail in Karachi’s District West in this budget," he revealed.