PESHAWAR, Sept 23: Personnel of the Customs Intelligence have seized a large quantity of silencer fitted AK-47 assault rifles which were being smuggled from Dara Adamkhel, Khyber Agency, to Punjab, sources said on Friday.
However, a senior official at the Customs Intelligence office told a press conference here that 23 automatic/semi automatic riffles, 67 magazines and 13,300 bullets had been recovered from a truck on the Indus Highway near Jurma area, Kohat, on Thursday. But the official did not say where the weapons were made.
Customs Intelligence Additional Director Akhtar Zaman Khattak said that two raiding parties were constituted on a prior tip-off about the smuggling of foreign-made arms and ammunition from Dara Adamkhel, the semi-autonomous Frontier Region of the Kohat district, for terrorist activities.
The parties intercepted the truck (Peshawar-K 4608) near Jurma area. The truck which was apparently loaded with clay pots was brought to Peshawar for a thorough search, he added.
During the search, the Customs Intelligence seized 23 foreign made rifles, 67 magazines and 13,300 bullets, he said.
Three men Alam Khan, son of Saadat Khan; Khalil, son of Haji Qamar Din; and Mohammad Islam, son of Abdul Ghani were arrested.
It was for the first time that Indian-made rifles have been seized by a law-enforcement agency in the NWFP, the sources said.
They said that though there was no mention of the make on the weapons, the Customs Intelligence got the services of police experts in arms and they confirmed that the weapons were Indian-made and latest version of the AK-47 assault rifles.
The sources said that the three smugglers got the weapons from Dara Adamkhel, the largest illicit arms market in Asia, and had to hand them over to some anti-social elements in Punjab.
The Indian weapons had never been seen in the open market of Dara Adamkhel, which indicated some new development in the region.
The government had already expressed its concern over the establishment of six Indian consulates in Afghan provinces hugging the western border of Pakistan.
The sources said that there might be some links between the two explosions in Lahore on Thursday which claimed six lives and the weapon seizure by the Customs Intelligence in Kohat.
The three detained men told interrogators that they were mere carriers, the sources added.
