Peshawar: Pakistani police today said they
had arrested two members of the banned Laskhar-e-Islam
militant group for their alleged links to a suicide attack in
a crowded commercial area that killed 50 people nearly two
months ago.
The suspects, Shakeel and Ismail, reportedly confessed
in preliminary statements to the police that they detonated a
car bomb in the congested Khyber Bazar on October 9.
Fifty people were killed and about 120 injured in the
attack.
Peshawar police chief Liaquat Ali Khan announced the
arrest of the two men at a news conference. Shakeel and
Ismail, both residents of the Khyber tribal region, were
presented before the media.
They were handcuffed and their heads were covered.
The two suspects were arrested during a raid in
Mandani area of Charsadda district.
In their confession, they claimed Syed Noor, the
mastermind of the attack, had promised to pay Rs 40,000 to
Ismail for parking the explosives-laden car in Khyber Bazaar.
Shakeel was assigned the responsibility of preparing
Ismail for the attack, they claimed. They also reportedly
confessed that some activists of the Lashkar-e-Islam had
accompanied the explosives-laden vehicle on a motorcycle to
Khyber Bazaar.
PTI
First Published: Wednesday, December 02, 2009, 22:12