LASHKAR-I-JHANGVI CHIEF MALIK ISHAQ, TWO SONS KILLED
IN MUZAFFARGARH 'ENCOUNTER'
LAHORE: Malik Ishaq, chief of banned
sectarian outfit Lashkar-i-Jhangvi, his two sons Usman and Haq Nawaz, and 11
others were killed in an alleged exchange of fire with police personnel late on
Tuesday night.
At least six policemen were injured
in the alleged encounter.
Ishaq and his sons were arrested by
the Counter-Terrorism Department a week ago. Following their latest arrest, the
police had interrogated them and had subsequently taken them to Shahwala in
Punjab's Muzaffargarh district to aid the police in recovering weapons and
explosives, sources in the CTD said.
The encounter appears to have taken
place as militants attacked security forces and tried to free Ishaq who was
killed in the ensuing exchange of fire, security sources say.
A spokesman for CTD Multan said
Ishaq, his two sons, one Ghulam Rasool Shah and two other accused, all from
Lashkar-i-Jhangvi, were taken to Muzaffargarh by the counter-terrorism
department to aid in the recovery of arms and explosives.
The spokesman said that when the police
party was returning after making the recovery, it was attacked by some 12 to 15
gunmen who succeeded in freeing Ishaq, his sons and the other accused and
fleeing away on motorcycles.
The militants were met with by SHO
CTD police station who had quickly been informed about the attack on the police
party and was travelling on the route that the militants had taken, the
spokesman said, adding that that’s how the encounter ensued.
The SHO challenged the militants,
resulting in the encounter in which six police personnel sustained injuries,
the spokesman said. They were shifted to the district headquarters hospital.
The spokesman added that 14
militants, including Malik Ishaq and Ghulam Rasool Shah, were killed by the
attackers themselves.
A large amount of weapons and
ammunition was recovered from the attacking men and an investigation has been
initiated into the events.
All bodies have been shifted to DHQ
Muzaffargarh. The bodies of Ishaq and his sons will undergo a postmortem before
being taken to Rahim Yar Khan, where he was based.
Know more: Analysis: Pakistan'smilitant 'rehabilitation’ problem
Lashkar-i-Jhangvi is regarded as the
most extreme Sunni terror group in Pakistan and is accused of killing hundreds
of Shias after its emergence in the early 1990s. The organisation is also said
to have links with Al Qaeda.
The organisation was banned more
than a decade ago by former president Pervez Musharraf.
Ishaq, who is a leader of the feared
organisation, has been implicated in dozens of cases, mostly murder.
He was arrested in 1997 and is
implicated in dozens of cases. He was released on bail in July 2011 after
serving a jail term of nearly 14 years.
Read more: Lashkar-e-Jhangvi and the"lack of evidence"
Since his 2011 release he has been
frequently put under house arrest as his sermons raised sectarian tensions. He
was also arrested in 2013 over deadly sectarian attacks targeting the Hazara
Shia community in Quetta. The first attack took place on Jan 10, 2013 targeting
a Hazara snooker hall and killing 92 people and the second bomb attack occurred
on Feb 16, killing 89 people. The attacks were claimed by Lashkar-i-Jhangvi.
Ishaq was also accused of
masterminding, from behind bars, the 2009 attack on the Sri Lankan cricket team
in Lahore, which wounded seven players and an assistant coach, and killed eight
Pakistanis.
The attacks saw Pakistan stripped of
its right to co-host the 2011 cricket World Cup and jeopardised the future of
international cricket in the country.
