What happened on Friday night at Sohrab Goth?

news-and-views In the alleged encounter, not a single policeman sustained even a minor bullet injury. They, however, managed to gun down five trained militants who had extremely sophisticated and lethal weaponry. Most interestingly, two of the ‘terrorists' killed by the police were still unidentified while three of them have been identified as Shah Hussain, son of Raj Khan, a resident of Wana, Shahid Khan son of Bakht Marjan and Ahmed Ali son of Ghulam Ali, a resident of Turbat, Balochistan. Even if the men killed by the police were terrorists, they were brought there from somewhere else and killed in cold blood, as the two-room compound declared as the hideout of Baitullah Mehsud's associates actually remains in the use of four watchmen who guard the land of the Bantwa Memon Housing Society. "There are four watchmen who live in this place and guard the land in two shifts in the day and night. This is the place where last night, the police killed five men by declaring them Baitullah Mehsud's associates and terrorists," the watchman of a vacant plot told The News while pointing towards the two separate blood stains in front of a small mosque. The place where the alleged encounter between the police and the suspected terrorists took place was hardly 10 minutes' drive away from Al-Asif Squre, Sohrab Goth, and was situated on the left of the Super Highway near Nadir Homeopathic Hospital. During a visit to the area, it was found that the area was generally uninhabited with a few compounds constructed at a distance from each other. It was mostly in the use of contractors, garbage collectors and many of the compounds were used as warehouses for storage of machinery and construction material. The availability of vacant plots has made it a favourite place for land-grabbers to encroach upon public and private lands and owing to that, most of the people seen in the area were armed gunmen, who remain there day and night with weapons in their hands to protect lands of their masters from encroachers. A few yards away from the Bantwa Memon Housing Society land, there were 12 armed men resting in an open tent. They told The News that they were guarding the land from encroachers. "Yes, we heard gunfire last night from that place," one of the armed men pointed towards the watchmen's room at the Bantwa Society's land, adding that they heard several bursts of Kalashnikovs from there. "But we are unaware of the presence of any militants there as the place is guarded by its own group of watchmen." "We know nothing about the men killed by the police as we have never seen any suspicious people here other than watchmen and those who come here as part of their businesses," he added. A visit of the exact spot where the alleged "encounter" took place showed that it was an open space in front of a single-room mosque adjacent to the Bantwa Society's guards' room where two large dried blood stains were strewn on the ground, showing killings of at least two persons on the ground. There were neither any bullet empties on the spot nor any bullet marks on the single-room mosque, which showed that it was in fact a "one-sided" encounter in which only the persons killed were fired upon by the police. "Owing to the presence of two watchmen always at a time and regular prayers at the mosque, there is no chance that around a dozen armed persons were living or hiding at this place" another local person, who lives near the place of the alleged police encounter, said. "Even if such men were hiding at this place, why its watchmen have not been taken into custody for their involvement as without their support, nobody can stay there even for an hour," the person questioned. SPO Sohrab Goth DSP Iftikhar Lodhi while talking to The News confirmed that a small compound and a mosque near the Nadir Homeopathic Hospital was the actual place where the police encounter took place and five suspected terrorists were killed while six or eight of their associates fled owing to darkness. "Actually, SP Gadap Rao Anwaar had received the information that some suspected terrorists belonging to the Baitullah Mehsud network in Karachi were hiding there, on which a police party went there and in an ensuing encounter, killed five of them. Six or eight of their associates fled from the scene due to the darkness," he claimed. According to him, one Kalashnikov and three TT pistols were also recovered from the possession of the slain terrorists. "No police personnel got injured in the encounter," he said, when asked if any of the law enforcing agencies' personnel sustained any wound in the encounter. The SPO Sohrab Goth said that three of the killed terrorists were identified as Shah Hussain son of Raj Khan, Shahid Khan son of Bakht Marjan and Ahmed Ali son of Ghulam Ali while the other two were still unidentified as no documents were recovered from them showing their whereabouts. SP Gadap Rao Anwaar could not be approached to seek his comments despite repeated attempts.

2009-06-27T16:50:53-06:00

The killing of five suspects in an alleged police encounter late Friday night on Super Highway near Sohrab Goth has raised several serious questions regarding the police claim of a crackdown on associates of Baitullah Mehsud from the banned Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP). Many people, especially residents of the area, described it as an "engineered encounter" and an act of "extrajudicial killing". 3206 true

2009-06-27T16:50:53-06:00

http://www.thenews.com.pk/print1.asp?id=185277 What happened on Friday night at Sohrab Goth?

2009-06-27T16:50:53-06:00