ISLAMABAD, June 9: Police have arrested two sisters who were allegedly plotting sectarian suicide attacks, officials said on Thursday.

They would have been the first women suicide bombers to strike the country and were the subject of an intensive year-long hunt by security forces.

Arifa and Habiba, said to be aged between 18 and 20, were seized from a hideout in Swat early this week, a security official told AFP.

Investigators said they were trained by their uncle, a top member of the banned Lashkar-i-Jhangvi, who was sentenced to death last week for killing 45 people in two suicide attacks in Karachi in 2004.

“Security agencies had been desperately looking for the two sisters and located them hiding in a house in Swat following a tip,” an official said.

“It would have been the first attack of its kind and a very difficult one to prevent,” said a police official.—AFP