Weapons seized from truck heading to Karachi

Excise and taxation department seize huge cache of weapons in raid at National Highway near Sindh-Punjab border.

SUKKUR:

The excise and taxation department seized a huge cache of weapons in a raid at the National Highway near the Sindh-Punjab border on Thursday.

The weapons were being transported to Karachi from South Waziristan in a truck with a licence plate AKD-584. Two suspects, Haider Ali and Muhammad Riaz, have been arrested in the case. Eight suicide jackets with timers attached to them were found among the weapons and a bomb disposal squad was summoned to defuse them.

The weapons also included seven empty jackets, 76 detonators, 38 rockets, three rocket launchers, 39 fuses, 18 remote controls, two dry batteries, one Kalashnikov, one 9mm pistol, more than 500 bullets, a 360 metre-long detonator wire and 40 kilogrammes of drugs.

According to the Excise and Taxation Minister Mukesh Kumar Chawla, “The driver of the truck said that it would explode if it was stopped”. He was speaking to the media after the Sindh Assembly session on Thursday.

The minister said that the case was still being investigated and further details would be revealed later. When questioned about the possibility of other trucks carrying ammunition being missed by the excise department, the minister responded, “This is the police’s job” and that, “you should be thankful that we have saved Karachi”.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 7^th, 2012.