KARACHI, March 6: The court of Judicial Magistrate East, Ganhwar Khan Gadehi issued show cause notice to the investigation officer (IO) for his failure to produce the three alleged suspects of Al-Qaeda in court. The accused were sent to jail on February 24 till March 2, but they were not produced on the date of hearing.

The court has ordered the IO to show cause within three days of non-compliance of the court order in this regard.

The accused, Mohammed Shahid alias Kashif, Mohammed Farhan alias Nasir and Ghani Subhan alias Rashid, are charged with planning to carry out suicide attacks on the Chehlum procession in the metropolis.

The CID Police arrested them from Gulistan-e-Johar after an encounter on February 16 and recovered a Kalashnikov, two TT pistols, three hand-grenades and a jacket used by suicide bombers from their possession. The police said theywere members of Qari Zafar group, affiliated with Al-Qaeda.

According to police, initial investigations revealed they were planning a suicide attack in Karachi on the day of Chehlum of Hazrat Imam Hussein (RA). Police said the group had also planned to carry out suicide attacks during IDEAS 2006 Exhibition at Karachi in November and Ashura procession but could not do so because of tight security measures.

The police said the accused had also disclosed the names of six accomplices as Tariq, Faisal, Ijaz, Naveed, Umer and Javed, who are still at large.