Police make headway in Daska mosque shooting probe

The Organised Crime Unit (OCU) arrested the suppliers of weapons to the suspected attackers, involved in shooting at a mosque in Daska town that killed three people, including a key figure, associated with the banned Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) group, police said on Thursday.

Police Superintendent Aftab Ahmad Phularwan announced the arrest of Sheraz Butt and Mamraiz Khan, at a press conference. He also revealed that a cache of prohibited-bore weapons, including 42 modern rifles, 58 handguns, and thousands of bullets, was recovered from the accused.

Also read: Perpetrators of Daska mosque attack arrested

The Daska mosque shooting took the lives of three people, including key JeM activist Shahid Latif, who had been arrested in Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIOJK) in 1993 and released in 2010. The Indian media had linked him to 2016 attack on the Pathankot Airbase.

“Sheraz Butt and Mamraiz Khan had been arrested for their involvement in the supply of illegal weapons to suspected shooters, believed to be agents of a hostile foreign intelligence agency responsible for targeted killings in various parts of Punjab,” Phularwan told the media at OCU Headquarters.

Butt and his brother Hasnain Butt, while posing as vegetable venders, smuggled machine guns and other weapons, hidden in vegetable carts to their customers according to police. Khan was responsible for smuggling weapons from Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa using various methods.

Also read: Two worshippers martyred in Daska during Fajr prayers

In a simultaneous operation, the OCU also apprehended two members of a gang involved in printing fake currency worth millions of rupees. The accused, identified as Rafaqat Ali and Sherbaz Khan, had been operating from a rented house in Harbanspura.

Phularwan said the duo had a criminal history and had been previously charged with similar offenses. Rafaqat Ali told the interrogators that he had unknowingly rented his house to a suspect, Ali Raza, who was still at large.

Sherbaz Khan disclosed that they produced the counterfeit currency using special paper, a laptop, printers, and other materials. Ali Raza, was the responsible for selling the fake currency in K-P after sending it in parcels, he added.