LAHORE: At least 20 people were killed and over 100 injured on October 15 when Taliban-linked terrorists wearing police and army uniforms struck Lahore, the capital of Pakistan’s Punjab province, by storming the headquarters of the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) besides attacking two police training centres in synchronised fidayeen attacks.
The fidayeen raids on a police academy in Manawan and an elite police training center in Bedian – both located on Lahore’s outskirts and the FIA headquarters in Lahore were the latest in a series of devastating strikes across the country, which are meant to dissuade the Pakistani security forces from pushing forward with a military offensive in South Waziristan, the primary stronghold of the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan. The attacks began around 9:15 a.m, four days after the bloody terrorist assault on the General Headquarters of Pakistan Army in Rawalpindi. In the first attack on the FIA offices, at least seven people were killed and another three injured, said Lahore Police Commissioner Pervez Khusro. By late morning, Pakistani security forces had retaken control of the building. At least one militant and four officials of the FIA were among those killed in that attack while the remaining four made good their escape, Khusro said.
The terrorist assault at the Manawan police academy was the second such attack by militants there this year. The attackers wore jogging shoes and were armed with explosives-filled suicide jackets and automatic rifles. They killed at least six security officers and wounded seven others, said Javed Rathore, a senior Lahore police official. Four militants were killed, at least two of whom detonated their suicide jackets after being surrounded. By early afternoon, police had secured the Manawan academy. The attackers wanted to take hostage some senior officers of the Punjab police to press for their demands, as had been the case with the GHQ attackers, but failed.
The third attack occurred at an elite police training center in Lahore, where ten militants scaled a perimeter wall to get inside. There was a subsequent gun battle between the police commandos and the highly armed militants, with helicopters hovering overhead. However, five hours later, five of the ten gunmen were killed while the five others managed to flee. A Punjab faction of the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan claimed responsibility for the attacks in Lahore. Shortly before the Lahore attacks, a suicide bomber rammed his explosive-laden car into the main gate of a police station in Kohat, a district in the troubled North West Frontier Province, killing 12 people.
Meanwhile, the ongoing spate of terrorist attacks on the highly secured army and police installations in Rawapindi and Lahore has simply belied the official claims of having broken the back of the jehadi mafia following the recent death of the Most Wanted Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan ameer Baitullah Mehsud, thus inviting the wrath of the general public. Anybody who thought that the jehadi mafia was close to defeat or was on the run had better think again. The chain of simultaneous terrorist attacks on two important installations of the police as well as the provincial headquarters of the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) is a grim reminder that the ongoing fight against militancy is far from over and that the Pakistani authorities have failed to dismantle the deep rooted terrorist network despite repeated claims to the contrary.
The general public believes that the state may be growing in confidence and developing better means to thwart the militants, especially after the August 7 death of Baitullah Mehsud in a US drone attack in Waziristan, but the threat of violence is still very real. Baitullah Mehsud’s successor Hakeemullah Mehsud, the ruthless young chief of the Tehrik-e-Taliban, had made it clear through a recent interview that he means business. And he has proved his words in view of the rising number of terror attacks in recent days. Despite all the official claims, the central question remains unanswered: is the present, sporadic violence a sign that the militancy phenomenon is in its last throes or does it represent a relative lull while the jehadis regroup? Whatever the answer, now is not the time for the state to change course. The people of Pakistan and those helping them deserve that the fight against militancy continue until it is finished.
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