KARACHI: Five ‘militants’ picked up

Published June 15, 2003

KARACHI, June 14: Police picked up five alleged militants of a banned jihadi outfit on Saturday on a tip off provided by a man, who had been injured in a blast near the Aladin Park on June 9.

The injured man, admitted to the Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre, had been identified as Mohammad Riaz, 27, who lost his hand in the blast.

According to the police, Riaz was allegedly carrying the bomb to plant it at the entrance of the park, which went off, while he was trying to fix the timer, due to mishandling.

On Raiz’s lead, the CID police picked up five alleged militants. “We have arrested five active members of the banned Harkatul Mujahideen, following recovery of a huge quantity of explosives, detonators, wireless sets, remote controlled devices, besides some unprepared bombs and a few live bombs,” a senior police official in the CID said.

He did not disclose the names of the alleged militants and also declined to mention places from where they had been picked up. However, he claimed that all the five men were experts in bomb making.

Earlier, the police had raided Riaz’s house, ST-18/C-93, sector 50/A, in Korangi No.4, and recovered 12 bags of ammonium nitrate, two boxes of explosive, a walkie-talkie, different sorts of wire, 12 detonators, and other material, used in making time bombs.

Following the recovery, the police picked up Riaz’s brothers, Shaukat Ali, Mehmood Ali and Mohammad Rashid, along with their father, Abdul Karim. Two others, Javed and Jibran Siddiqui, were also picked up in connection with the blast.