MULTAN, Pakistan: Police have killed Malik Ishaq among 16 terrorists belonging to the banned Lashkar-i-Jhangvi (LJ), regarded as the most extreme Sunni terror group in Pakistan.
It happened when an encounter took place between police personnel and the terrorists in Punjab’s Muzaffargarh district early on Wednesday.
In the encounter, 16 terrorists including the LI Chief Malik Ishaq, his two sons namely Haq Nawaz and Usman were killed. Six police personnel were also injured in the exchange of fire.
The injured and dead bodies were shifted to District Headquarters Hospital in Muzaffargarh.
The security sources said that the Counter-Terrorism Department (CTD) arrested Malik Ishaq and his sons a week ago. Following their latest arrest, the police had interrogated them and had subsequently taken them to Shahwala in Muzaffargarh district to aid the police in recovering weapons and explosives.
But when police was returning after making the recovery, it was attacked by some 12 to 15 gunmen. Subsequently en exchange of fire erupted between the two sides which caused deaths of 16 terrorists and injuries to six policemen.
The outlawed organization Lashkar-i-Jhangvi is accused of killing hundreds of Shias after its emergence in the early 1990s. It was banned more than a decade ago by former President Pervez Musharraf while its Chief Malik Ishaq has been implicated in dozens of cases mostly murder.