LAHORE, Feb 4: Intelligence agencies and police in a joint operation arrested on Tuesday two passengers at the Lahore airport on suspicion of their links with Al Qaeda.

Passengers were boarding a Gulf-bound flight (QR-335) at 9am when officials of intelligence agencies and police reached there.

After offloading all passengers, they picked up Muhammad Ibrar and Muhammad Altaf and drove them to Chuhng sub-jail for interrogation. Ibrar belonged to Hyderabad and Altaf to Sawat.

Immigration authorities said they were not arrested for possessing bogus travel documents but for other “reasons”.

“We have checked their travel documents but nothing was found wrong,” they claimed.

When contacted, a senior police official said the police had nothing to do with the operation as it only provided force for it. He denied that police were investigating the suspects. “The agencies have arrested the suspects and are interrogating them,” he said.

Police sources said the intelligence agencies had conducted the operation at the eleventh hour on a tip off.