'SRA terrorist' wanted in multiple cases arrested in Karachi

KARACHI: The Counter-Terrorism Department (CTD) has arrested an alleged terrorist associated with the banned Sindh Revolutionary Army (SRA) during a joint raid conducted with a federal sensitive agency in Karachi, ARY News reported on Tuesday.

The ‘trained’ SRA terrorist Sajjad aka Bablo s/o Ghulam Abbas has been arrested by CTD and a sensitive agency from Met roundabout of Karachi’s University Road beside the recovery of hand grenade from his possession.

According to the CTD spokesperson, the arrested member of an outlawed organisation SRA made revelations during the interrogation.

Sajjad was wanted in multiple cases of facilitating attacks on Rangers, as well as planning to target Chinese engineers’ van and August 14 Independence rallies and stalls last year.

Read: CTD prepares new edition of Red Book on terrorists

Sajjad has allegedly confessed to facilitating an attack on a Rangers’ van in Liaquatabad on June 19 – 2020 which resulted in the killing of a citizen and injuring seven others including a Rangers official.

The accused along with his accomplices had attacked a bakery owned by a retired Rangers officer on July 8 – 2020. The retired Rangers officer had lost his life in the grenade attack.

The CTD spokesperson revealed that Sajjad had devised a plan to attack a Chinese engineers’ van over the directives of SRA leadership. However, they failed to carry out the attack after going into hiding due to the raids of law enforcement agencies.

Moreover, he also planned to target a Rangers check post near the Karachi airport after the SRA leadership ordered them to take revenge for Niaz Lashari’s killing.

Read: Two terrorists of banned outfit killed in encounter with CTD

The accused had held a meeting with his accomplices including Javed Mangrio and Basheer Shar in Muhammad Khan Goth to finalise the plan for attacking the Rangers check post but they attack was postponed after Javed Mangrio failed to provide grenade to the terrorists. However, they carried out a grenade attack on a Rangers vehicle in Liaquatabad after three days.

On August 11 last year, Sajjad and accomplices planned to attack a state agency in Ghazi Goth.

During the interrogation, Sajjad revealed that he and his accomplices planned to carry out a grenade attack on Mubina Town police station, but they postponed to carry out the terror attack due to strict security measures at the police station.

The SRA terrorist later planned to target stalls established at Johar Complex in connection with Independence Day, however, they chose not to carry out the attack due to the presence of a large number of families and children.

The accused had issued instructions to the different terrorist teams over the orders of SRA’s Sajjad Shah alias Sodho Sindhi to plan attacks on Independence Day rallies last year by using hand grenades, bottle bomb and weapons for mass murder. However, the terrorists’ plan had been foiled due to the arrests of Sajjad’s accomplices by the law enforcement agencies.

The spokesperson said that teams have been constituted comprising officials of CTD and federal sensitive agency to arrest Sajjad’s accomplices.