ISLAMABAD, 8 March 2005 — The Interior Ministry has asked provincial authorities to compile data of officials allegedly involved in supporting elements of defunct religious outfits, sources said.
These officials had allegedly leaked information to such outfits about the measures the government was taking against them, sources added. The orders were issued in light of reports by intelligence agencies that a majority of raids conducted by law enforcement agencies against elements of banned outfits were unsuccessful because of information leaks, they said. The reports also stated that as law enforcement agencies had planned these raids, only government officials could have been involved in the leaks, sources said.
All provincial police officers and the federal capital inspector general of police were also asked to form teams consisting of police and district officials at the district level to compile reports on the links of government officials including officials of law enforcement agencies with banned organizations, the sources added.
They were also asked to get information on the relatives of officials involved in sectarian violence and who were supporting armed religious groups, they said, adding that the reports would be sent to the Establishment Division and other departments concerned for examination. Officials would be terminated from service if proven guilty in this regard.
Law enforcement agencies had raided several locations countrywide to arrest elements of defunct religious organizations after sectarian violence in Gilgit, but most elements managed to escape at the last moment. Elements who had threatened Kashmir Affairs Minister Faisal Saleh Hayat also managed to escape because information about the raid had been leaked to them.
Meanwhile, three high-ranking Taleban officials arrested in Pakistan during the last three months have been sent to a US military base at Bagram in Afghanistan, sources said.
Quoting highly-placed Afghan intelligence agents, sources said that the officials include former police chief of Nangarhar province Maulvi Mohammad Taha, the ousted regime’s top military commander Mulla Abdul Razzaq and the leader of Taleban’s splinter faction Jaish-e-Muslimeen, Syed Akbar Agha.
Agha had been suspected to have masterminded the abduction of three United Nations election workers in Kabul last October. The three workers Annetta Flanigan of Northern Ireland, Shqipe Hebibi of Kosovo and Filipino diplomat Angelito Nayan were released after a month. The three Taleban officials, were sent to the US-controlled Bagram Airbase in Afghanistan on Friday, sources said.
Sources said a US military spokesman Maj. Steve Wollman said he could not confirm or deny the reports. A Taleban spokesman, Mufti Latifullah Hakimi, said he did not know whether Taha had been arrested, but he did confirm the detention of Razzaq and Akbar Agha.
