RAWALPINDI (The Thursday Times) — Security forces have cleared two terrorist hideouts set up inside mosques in North Waziristan’s Mir Ali area and recovered a large cache of explosives, weapons and ammunition, the military’s media wing said on Monday.
The Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) said the intelligence-based operation took place in Muzak village, on the southern edge of Mir Ali, against hideouts of what it called the Indian proxy Fitna al-Khawarij, the state’s term for terrorists of the banned Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan.
What was found: the cache included prepared improvised explosive devices, explosive-making material, weapons and ammunition, the ISPR said. It said the terrorists had deliberately set up the hideouts in mosques to store explosives and were also running torture cells there. The statement did not mention any casualties.
The ISPR called the use of the mosques a “reprehensible desecration of places of worship”, and said the terrorists, abetted by the Afghan Taliban, “have nothing to do with Islam”. A clearance operation was continuing to eliminate any other hideouts in the area, it said.
Reaction: President Asif Ali Zardari and Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif commended the security forces. In separate messages, they said using mosques to store explosives and as centres of violence was a blatant violation of the fundamental teachings of Islam. The prime minister said operations to eliminate terrorism completely would continue “with full force”.
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Governor Faisal Karim Kundi said in a video message that intelligence-based operations would be intensified further to ensure peace in the province.
