PAKISTAN: Pakistan has arrested the nephew of the alleged mastermind of the September 11th attacks and eight other militants suspected of ambushing Karachi's military commander, the information minister said yesterday.
6Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed said that security forces had seized Musaad Aruchi, an Arab, whom he described as an important al-Qaeda member with a $1 million bounty on his head.
"It is a big success for us in the war against terror," the minister said.
Aruchi is the nephew of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the suspected chief planner of the September 11th attacks who was arrested in the city of Rawalpindi near Islamabad in March last year. He was the most senior al-Qaeda member to have been caught.
Ahmed did not give any details of the arrest of Khalid's nephew or say when he was caught.
In a separate development, the minister said eight militants suspected of involvement in an attack on Karachi's army chief had also been arrested.
Gunmen ambushed a convoy escorting Lieutenant-General Ahsan Saleem Hayat on a main road in the volatile port city last Thursday.
Hayat escaped unharmed, but 10 people were killed. Atta-ur Rehman, the suspected ring-leader of the group, was among the eight men arrested, Ahmed said.
"These men were trained in the tribal region of Wana," the minister said. "They are involved in most of the high-profile terror attacks, including the June 14th, 2002, suicide bombing outside the US consulate in Karachi." Ahmed said the group had organised itself under the name of Jundullah.
Authorities believe the ambush was in response to a security force operation to flush out al-Qaeda-linked militants in the tribal region of South Waziristan, southwest of Islamabad.
Wana is the main town of the semi-autonomous tribal region bordering Afghanistan, where security forces say more than 600 foreign militants are hiding.
Pakistani army and paramilitary troops say they have killed at least 55 militants in five days of intense fighting, for the loss of 17 men.