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LAHORE, Pakistan : Pakistani police said Sunday they had busted a gang of pro-Taliban militants planning major terrorist attacks in the country.
An official statement released here said the militants "got training in Afghanistan in making explosive devices" and were "planning to carry out bomb blasts at several places in Lahore."
The eight-member gang was also involved in training other militants in bomb making and the use of explosive devices, the statement said.
Information Minister Mohammad Ali Durrani also said the militants were "plotting attacks inside Pakistan and they were trained in the neighbouring country."
Earlier a senior police official speaking on condition of anonymity said the militants during interrogation "confessed" that they were sending suicide bombers for attacks in Afghanistan.
The eight-member group led by former fighters of the banned Jaish-e-Mohammad militant faction was based in Quetta, the capital of southwestern Baluchistan province, the official said.
They used to collect materials and volunteers from the central province of Punjab, he said, requesting anonymity. The suspects were arrested in Punjab over the past few days.
The police official identified the gang leaders as Mufti Saghir Ahmed, a veteran of the 1980s war against invading Soviet troops in Afghanistan, and wanted militant Mohammad Safeer. Both are members of the Jaish group, he said.
"The suspects were preparing remote-controlled devices for the Taliban," the official said.
"It's a major breakthrough in the fight against terrorism and reflects Pakistan's strong commitment to fight militancy," a senior security official said.
The network had "links" with former mujahedin leader Jalaluddin Haqqani and his pro-Taliban son Siraj Haqqani, he added.
Last year, nearly 300 Afghan civilians were killed in about 140 suicide attacks, most of them claimed by the Taliban, according to Human Rights Watch. There were 25 suicide bombings in the country in 2005.
Relations between Pakistan and Afghanistan, who are key allies in the US-led "war on terror," have been tense over accusations that Islamabad is not doing enough to stop Taliban militants based in Pakistan from launching cross-border attacks.
Islamabad says it has nearly 90,000 troops on the Pakistan-Afghanistan border to stop militants moving between the countries, and that it has arrested more militant leaders than Kabul.
Pakistan also insists the Taliban command structure is based in the southern Afghan city of Kandahar and security agencies in Pakistan continue to hunt down elements on its territory.
Lahore Police chief, Malik Mohammad Iqbal, told a news conference later that police recovered a large quantity of explosives from the gang.
"This is a major achievement," he said, adding that one of the suspects was an expert in making improvised explosive devices.
Safeer was a key figure who had a bounty of one million rupees (16,600 dollars) on his head over involvement in the 2002 attack on a church in Taxila, 25 kilometres (15 miles) north of Islamabad, in which three female nurses were killed, Iqbal said.
Jaish was banned by key US ally President Pervez Musharraf in 2002. It was blamed by India for the 2001 attack on its parliament in New Delhi.
The group is also linked to the 2002 kidnapping and murder of US journalist Daniel Pearl in the southern city of Karachi.
It was also accused of cooperating with Al-Qaeda in two failed assassination bids on Musharraf in December 2003.
- AFP
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