JI leader targeted in failed bomb plot

Three militants, one policeman killed in a separate clash in Awami Market.

PESHAWAR:

A Jamaat-e-Islami leader survived a potential bomb attack when a six-kilogramme improvised explosive device (IED) was defused from outside his house by a Bomb Disposal Unit here on Monday.

The police defused a six kilogramme IED planted outside the house of JI Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa General Secretary Shabbir Ahmed Khan.

A police official from the Faqirabad police station told The Express Tribune that they had received a call from the JI leader at around 7:00 AM about a suspicious package outside his home. Following that, a Bomb Disposal Unit (BDU) was dispatched to the scene.

He said that the explosives were packed in a plastic bag and placed outside the boundary wall of Khan’s home in the Afghan Colony.

SSP Operation Ijaz Ahmed told The Express Tribune that it was an IED device weighing around six kilogrammes and fitted with a prima card and a detonator. “Six kilogrammes of explosives is a big amount and would have caused considerable damage had it not been defused in time,” Ijaz said.

The JI has announced to hold protest rallies across the province against the attempted assassination of its leader.

Khan, while talking to reporters, alleged that it was the Blackwater and American agencies that were behind such attacks.

Meanwhile, in a separate incident the same day, three militants and a policeman were killed in a clash.

An official of the Hayatabad Police Station told The Express Tribune that the clash took place around 2:00 AM, when an unspecified number of militants attacked a police patrol in the Awami Market on Jamrud Road.

The official said that at least three militants and a policeman were killed in the clash, while another policeman sustained injuries. He said that some other militants managed to escape in the cover of the darkness.

He added that the police had also recovered arms and ammunition from the militants who were killed. However, there was no word on the identification of the militants.

The slain policeman was identified as ASI Sajid Iqbal.

Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP) Operation Peshawar Ijaz Ahmed told The Express Tribune that there were around 15-20 attackers. He said that the attackers had come from the Khyber Agency side and were affiliated with the Bara based militant outfit Lashkar-e-Islam (LI). “There were people from Jamrud, Shalobar area of Bara tehsil and some Afghans among the attackers,” Ahmed said.

City Police chief Liaquat Ali Khan told reporters said that militants have entered the cities under the guise of internally displaced persons.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 12^th,  2011.