Police officials said that even though no senior member of the militant groups had been arrested, the captives were likely to assist them in tracing the movements of militants in the region.
“The Ahle Sunnat Aal Jamat has organised huge rallies and gatherings in the last two months in Rahim Yar Khan and the accused insist they belong to this group,” police officials said. On Saturday, local police conducted raids in Rahim Yar Khan, Sadiqabad, Liaqatpur, Ahmed Pur Sherqia and other localities and arrested five people. “Not all the terrorists ‘look’ the same anymore. We have apprehended several suspects in western clothes, they are changing their technique,” SHO Rahmat Tarrar said.
Ahle Sunnat Wal jamat worker Javed Iqbal was arrested from Bandore; Khatam Nabuwat Maulvi Abdul Shakoor Farooqui was arrested from the Cheni Goth madrassa; Jamia Khulfai Rashideen Mufti Muhammad Ismail was arrested from an Ahmed Pur Sherqia madrassa and Ahle Sunnat Wal Jamat workers Qari Azi and Abdul Haye were arrested from other localities in the district. Police raided the madrassa of Jamiat Ulema Islam (JUI) Samiul Haq leader Hafiz Akbar Awan but no one was arrested. In Sadiqbad, an Ahle Sunnat Wal Jamat madrassa in Arif Town was raided and the houses of Baba Amin Mujahid and district president Shafiq Muawiya were also raided but no arrests were made. Another madrassa in Adam Sahaba was raided but no one was arrested.
According to the police “most of the active leaders are in hiding and have also switched off their mobile phones. They are becoming increasingly hard to track and are in civilian garb, we caught three of the men in jeans and they were clean shaven,” Tarrar said.
Published in The Express Tribune, July 13th, 2010.
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