RAWALPINDI: An elite force Sub-Inspector (SI) and five others, including a suspected militant, two women and two children, were killed when police forces raided a residence believed to be housing a suspect involved in the attack on former Punjab home minister Col (retd) Shuja Khanzada.
The police party raided a house located on Dhamial Road on a tip off that a militant wanted in Shuja Khanzada murder case is using it as a hideout.
As law enforcement personnel entered the house, the militant along with his wife opened fire and hurled grenades at them. Later, the woman blew herself up using a suicide jacket killing herself, the man and three children, according to CTD police sources.
The deceased terrorist was identified as Qaisar Mustafa alias Imran while the woman was one Malika, Qaisar’s wife. Three of their children namely three year old Sawera, three year old Azan and two year old Muhammad too died during the operation.
Four policemen were wounded in the attack while the raiding party took at least four suspects into custody from the house.
Qaisar and his wife were living in the house as a tenant since 2014 and the neighbours have complained to police about their suspicious activities in the past too, residents of the area told DawnNews.
An Assistant Sub-Inspector (ASI) and three other policemen were also injured during the raid, while three suspected militants, including a woman, were killed during the exchange of fire with security forces, police sources said.
Those injured were admitted to District Headquarters Hospital Rawalpindi for treatment.
The area has been cordoned off and a thorough search of the residence is under way. Police are expected to interrogate those taken into custody.
In September, the Counter-Terrorism Department had announced the arrest of a suspected facilitator of the attack on Khanzada, Qasim Muavia.
A CTD source said Muavia was a member of the Qari Sohail Group and had been on the ‘most wanted list’ of the CTD for his alleged involvement in target killings in the Attock district.
The involvement of Qari Sohail Group in the suicide attack emerged when the investigators found a motorcycle abandoned at the scene of the attack. The bike was suspected to be used by the bomber for reaching Khanzada’s dera in the Shadi Khan village of Attock, Dawn newspaper had reported.
Within a week of the announcement of Muavia’s arrest, the CTD conducted an intelligence-based raid on a house in Iqbal Town Division’s Sherakot area on the outskirts of Lahore.
During the ‘encounter’, four people suspected of involvement in the Khanzada attack were killed.
Shuja Khanzada was killed in a suicide attack on his political office in Shadi Khan village, Attock, in August, along with 16 others.
Two suicide bombers affiliated with the Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) carried out the bombing, a provincial government official had earlier said. Two additional suicide bombers had been deputed to Lahore to attack Khanzada’s residence, the official said, but they were recalled after the Attock attack.
Following the incident, a First-Information Report (FIR) had been filed by the Station House Officer (SHO) Ghulam Shabbir of the Rangoo police station on behalf of the state against those involved in the attack.
An initial investigation report given to Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif revealed that the home minister was killed in retaliation of the killing of Lashkar-i-Jhangvi chief Malik Ishaq and others.
