CTD seizes IED made from mortar shell

Officials claim bomb was meant to cause mayhem on Ashura or August 14

KARACHI:

The Counter-Terrorism Department (CTD) of Sindh Police officials have claimed that they have seized an improvised explosive device (IED) made from a mortar shell.

"This is the first time the CTD has recovered such a device," an officer told The Express Tribune while sharing details of the ongoing interrogation of a man, named Shiraz Ahmed, who was taken into custody on Saturday in connection with a bomb blast in Saddar on May 12, this year.

Shiraz is said to be a member of the Sindh Revolutionary Army (SRA), a defunct group that allegedly carries out terrorist attacks in Pakistan at the behest of the Indian intelligence agency RAW, CTD officers said requesting anonymity.

"The type of explosive device recovered from Shiraz has never been used in terrorism before," the CTD officer told The Express Tribune. "It is company-made mortar shell attached to an IED. Two detonators are used in the device which was attached to a 15-second timer and a remote control."

According to CTD sources, it was highly unlikely for an ordinary terrorist to make such an explosive device. It must have been prepared by an explosives expert. "It was skillfully defused by the CTD," the officer said.

The CTD is interrogating Shiraz and gathering information from a laptop recovered from his possession at the time of his arrest. The terrorists cell, of which Shiraz was a member, was planning attacks during Muharram and on August 14 in Baldia Town.

CTD interrogators are also questioning him for his possible involvement in a grenade attack on a truck in Baldia Town on August 14, last year. Thirteen people, including women and children, were killed when suspects lobbed a grenade inside a truck carrying guests of a wedding procession.

CTD sources say that raids are being conducted to arrest other members of Shiraz's cell.

 

Published in The Express Tribune, August 12^th, 2022.