ISLAMABAD (Kashmir English): Security forces have arrested four facilitators of the suicide bomber and mastermind behind the deadly attack on the Tarlai mosque near Rawalpindi, which killed at least 31 and injured hundreds.
According to the security sources, intelligence and law enforcement agencies raided and arrested in Peshawar and Nowshera. Operations were carried out as a result of technical and human intelligence, sources said.
As a result of the operations, four facilitators of the suicide bomber were arrested, and the mastermind, an Afghan national and linked with Daesh, was also taken into custody. “The attack was planned, and the attacker was trained and brainwashed by ISIS in Afghanistan,” sources added.
The security sources also confirmed that during the operations, an armed personnel was martyred and three others were injured. “More intelligence-based operations against terrorists are underway,” they said.
“ISIS and other terrorist organizations under the auspices of the Afghan Taliban are a major threat to regional and global peace,” Security sources added.
Earlier today, intelligence sources said that authorities have arrested close relatives of the suicide bomber. The alleged suicide bomber, Yasir Khan, a resident of Peshawar, had remained in contact with his brother-in-law, Usman, sources said.
Yasir’s two brothers, Bilal and Nasir, along with Usman, were also arrested. Officials said the bomber’s brother had been detained in Peshawar, while his brother-in-law was picked up during operations linked to the case.
Moreover, a key facilitator associated with the attack was killed in an operation in Nowshera, the sources said. The most significant arrest, according to intelligence officials, was that of the bomber’s mother, who was taken into custody from a house in a posh sector of Islamabad.
Authorities said nationwide operations were underway to dismantle the terrorist network behind the attack.
Investigators have also pieced together the bomber’s movements in the months leading up to the attack. Intelligence sources said Yasir travelled to Afghanistan in May and returned in June. He later went to Bajaur in June, where he activated a SIM card. From June 27 to October, he stayed in Bajaur before moving to Hakeemabad in Nowshera.
