Pakistan Today

Lal Masjid clerics had contacts with terrorists, commission told

The government institutions have told the Lal Masjid Commission that the administration of the mosque had contacts with Al Qaeda and other terrorist outfits.
According to sources, the commission was told that a report of an intelligence agency on February 10, 2007 revealed that Ismail, a terrorist who was present inside the Lal Masjid, asked for help from then TTP chief Baitullah Mehsud and sent two people to South Waziristan Agency to bring arms and ammunition. On February 3, another report said that a suicide bomber was seen in the limits of Lal Masjid. Besides that, the commission was told that 38 FIRs were registered against the Lal Masjid administration and students for harassing the people and taking the law into their own hands from January to June 2007. According to sources, it proved that the Lal Masjid administration was spreading violence and fear in the area on the strength of armed students.
On January 3, 2007, Zawar Hussain, a resident of Aabpara, registered an FIR saying that a marriage ceremony was underway at Aabpara Community Centre at 10pm when around 100-150 students of Lal Masjid, some of them wielding Kalashnikovs, pistols and batons, came there and threatened the people to stop fireworks otherwise they would turn the celebration into a tragedy. In the meanwhile, Lal Masjid cleric Abdul Aziz announced on loudspeaker to bring the bridegroom to the mosque. Another FIR was also registered on April 6, according to which the armed students blocked the road from both sides and Aziz was repeatedly announcing on loudspeaker that they did not recognise the government and they wanted Shariah implementation. He stated that they would fight with the government machinery.
According to sources, the commission was told that on July 3, a report of assistant inspector general (Special Branch) said that at 12pm around 30-40 armed students came out of the Lal Masjid and scuffled with nine police officials, including an inspector and snatched four small machine guns. A lot of armed people were present in the trenches and the mosque admin was telling its ‘fidayeen’ on loudspeakers to be ‘prepared’. In the meanwhile, firing started from the Lal Masjid in which Rangers official Mubarak Hussain embraced martyrdom.
Similarly, sensitive agencies issued more than 100 alerts on different occasions that the mosque clerics were harassing the people. After the July 3, 2007 incident, the district magistrate requested the government that the situation went out of police control, therefore, the army should be called in.
Meanwhile, the Interior Ministry requested the Defence Ministry to send the army to restore law and order.
Among other evidences, sources said, the government authorities also referred to “Inside Al Qaeda and Taliban”, the book of slain journalist Saleem Shahzad, in which it has been stated on pages 24-31 that Egyptian Al Qaeda leader Sheikh Esa, who had announced war against Pakistan, came to the country in 2003 and met Lal Masjid clerics – Abdul Aziz and his brother Abdur Rasheed Ghazi.

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