28 March 2004	Sunday	06 Safar 1425

PESHAWAR, March 27: Investigators looking into Tuesday's missile attack on Peshawar were still groping in the dark as to the launching site despite the passage of four days , interviews with senior police officials revealed.

They were also unable to say whether the missile attack had any connection with the ongoing operation against militants in South Waziristan tribal region.

Police claim that the four missiles which hit different parts of the city appeared to have been fired from Shahkas in the adjoining tribal territory.

Police officials said the missiles had a range of 11 kms to 16 kms which meant that they had come from the tribal territory.

A senior official in the Fata Secretariat however, had a different view. Brig Mehmood Shah told a news briefing few days ago that the missiles had a range of about eight kms and placed the launching site somewhere on the Peshawar Ring Road in Pishtakhara area limit.

Police told Dawn that the missile was Russian made, weighing 25 kilograms and 17MM long. But still they are unable to say that why the missiles of immense weight could not cause that much damage which they should have done.

Experts say it was a handiwork of some trained people, who had reduced the intensity of the missiles before they were fired.

Neither police nor federal agencies' investigation teams have the expertise to exactly tell the range and the strength. They had never used these weapons, sources maintained.

The provincial and federal investigation agencies were working independently without any coordination and putting responsibility on each others for their failure to locate the launching site of missiles and netting the culprits, the sources maintained.

They, however, said that regardless of where the missiles were fired from, both the police and other federal agencies would have to step up vigilance.

Police claimed that three of the four missiles were fired at the same time, while the forth one was launched after few minutes from the mountains in Shahkas area in the Khyber Agency near Hayatabad Phase VI.

The city police formed two inspection teams. One team was busy in collecting evidences from Hayatabad Phase-VI area, while the other was combing Pishtakhara locality.

According to sources, they were informed by the residents in Hayatabad township and Sofaid Dheri area of having seen lightening objects flying overhead which indicated that the missiles were fired from Shahkas mountains.

Police officials claimed that the missiles would have caused extensive damage had they been fired from six kilometres.

Meanwhile, the East-Cantt and Kabuli police stations have registered separate case against the terrorists under 3/4 Explosive Act, 324 PPC and 7 Anti-Terrorism Act.