Karachi The Special Investigation Unit (SIU), Karachi, has arrested eight alleged terrorists of the banned Sipah-i-Mohammed (SM) after two encounters. They also recovered arms and ammunitions from their possession. The accused were alleged to have been involved in a number of sectarian killings in the city. Their victims had also included some religious personalities. Police also found a hit-list from their possession. The Capital City Police Officer (CCPO) of Karachi, Fayyaz Ahmed Leghari, addressed a press conference at the SIU Headquarters where he was accompanied by the Karachi SIU chief, SSP Raja Umer Khattab, the DIG of South Zone, Iqbal Mehmood, and other senior officers. CCPO Leghari said that the cases of sectarian killings in which several innocent people and religious scholars and leaders were killed had increased in the past few years, creating anxiety among the religious scholars and doctors. In this regard, he had assigned SSP Omer Khattab the task of dismantling the network of the terrorists. During the course of investigation the SIU had been tipped off about some terrorists belonging to banned religious outfits being active in the city, who were being trained in Parachinar and Gilgit and who had escaped to Parachinar after committing acts of terrorism. Moreover, they were being paid on a monthly basis and that they belonged to the banned Sipah-i-Mohammad. CCPO Leghari said that the group had formed a new wing and called it the “Mehdi Force”. The Sindh government had already announced a reward for their arrest. He added that during the investigation, the personnel of Karachi SIU had once before come very close to arresting the accused when they had been trapped near Moti Mehal in Gulshan-e-Iqbal on December 18 last year, but on seeing the police an encounter ensued and the suspects managed to flee the scene under the cover of fire. An FIR had been lodged at the police station concerned. On Sunday, the SIU again received a tip-off that the suspects, with their leader, Syed Tanveer Abbas Rizvi alias Kashif alias Mehdi, would visit Gulshan-e-Iqbal in a Suzuki Khyber with a fake number plate (GS-0022) using the route from Nipa to Safoora Goth. Acting on the tip-off, SSP Umer Khattab placed SIU teams at the location identified, and early on Sunday morning they had an encounter with the suspects near the NED University. After the encounter Tanveer Abbas, Ibrar Hussain, Pervez Zaidi, Riffat alias Jehangir and Hasnain Abbas were arrested. The suspects were immediately taken to the investigation unit. During the investigations they identified areas where their companions had been hiding. At this, the personnel of the SIU raided different localities and after encounters arrested Sikander alias Sajid, Ali Mehdi alias Bablu and Kumail with arms. The arms recovered from the possession of the suspects were Kalashnikovs, hand grenades, 9mm pistols, TT pistols, Mouser, some electronic items and hundreds of bullets. During the investigations, the accused disclosed that the group leader of the Mehdi Force was Tanveer Abbas alias Kashif alias Mehdi, who had also been assigned the task of training new recruits inducted into the group and that when they returned to their hideouts after committing terrorism acts they were paid Rs8,000 to Rs15,000 a month. Moreover, Tanveer used to provide motorcycles, cars and rented houses for his accomplices’ shelter, the CCPO said and added that during the interrogations the accused also disclosed that the funds were provided by one Ashraf and that during one-and-a-half years they had spent more than five million rupees for the said purpose. It was further disclosed that another companion of the group, Syed Ibrar Rizvi alias Mushtaq, had been one of the main members of the Mehdi Force who took instructions from the group leader, Tanveer Abbas, and also distributed money among the terrorists. Moreover, Ibrar Rizvi also assigned the terrorists the targets whom they later killed. Moreover, until now more than 18 youngsters had been trained and those who were sent from Karachi to Parachinar were picked up by the group members from the bus stand there and taken to unknown destinations where they were trained in using arms, hand grenades, rocket launchers and on making bombs. The CCPO said that the suspects belonged to Orangi Town, Buffer Zone, Malir and New Karachi where they had been very active. Their other companions were identified as Zaki Kazmi, Shafaat Hussain, Ashraf, Mohsin, Farhat, Danish and Zeeshan Ali Abbas whom the police were searching and that the network had been active in Karachi since March 2009. The suspects also disclosed that they had killed three doctors and others who had had affiliations with the banned Sipah-e-Sahaba, Lashker-e-Jhangvi and Jaish-e-Mohammad. They had killed Dr Babar Manan, Dr Javed Shakoor, Dr Khursheed, Mohammad Nisar, Mahvia, Mukhtar Ali, Naeem Ahmed, Ashraf Haroon, Mushtaq Ahmed, Qari Iqbal, Mohammad Imran, Mudassir Alam and others, the CCPO said and added that the police had also recovered a hit-list from the possession of the suspects having the names of religious scholars, Ulema and some police officers. SSP Raja Umer Khattab said that the ring leader, Tanveer Abbas, had been affiliated with the group for a long time, was trained in Parachinar and paid Rs50,000 a month. He had also been trained in jamming the phone tracking system. He also provided spy cameras in the form of pens and spectacles. Further investigations are under way.
