Dangerous militants among 384 escape after Bannu jail attack
Baku, April 16 (AZERTAC). BANNU: In what is being described as the biggest jail-break in the country’s history, over 100 militants stormed the central prison here after Saturday midnight and freed 384 prisoners, among them a man sentenced to death for trying to assassinate former president Pervez Musharraf.
According to an official, 100 to 150 militants arrived on pick-ups at about 1.30am and attacked the prison housing over 900 inmates after blowing up the main gates with rocket-propelled grenades.
They broke open locks of cells, including those housing hardened criminals and condemned prisoners and blasted metal doors, the official said.
“The attackers appeared to be in control of the prison for more than two hours. The guards offered little or no resistance after the militants asked them to step aside.”
The brazen attack and its scale showed that no place in the province is adequately protected or safe.
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa police chief Akbar Khan Hoti, who visited the jail along with Home Secretary Azam Khan, called it a security lapse. “We are inquiring into the incident,” he told reporters.
He quoted the prison guards as saying that the attackers had accurate information about cells in which militants had been kept.
The police official said there were 21 condemned prisoners in the jail but the attackers appeared to be interested mainly in freeing the man who was on death row for the high-profile assassination attempt.
The militants had blocked all roads leading to the prison by erecting barricades and deploying pickets to keep law-enforcement personnel away, a security official said.
Police arrived at the place only when the militants had escaped after freeing the prisoners, he said.
Four guards injured in the attack were admitted to a local hospital, he said.
A terrorist of Afghan origin was among seven of the escaped prisoners arrested by police at a checkpoint on Terri bypass while they were going towards the border area after having sneaked into Karak from Bannu.
District police chief Sajjad Khan said at a press conference that Mohammad Zarif of Khost in Afghanistan, Manzoor Ali of Parachinar, Mohammad Nabi of Hangu, Hizar Hayat of Kohat and Eid Mohammad, Mohammad Sharif and Khalilur Rehman of Sadda had been apprehended.
He said Zarif was a terrorist who had been sentenced to life imprisonment in a murder case. The other arrested prisoners were involved in murder cases, he said. The banned Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan claimed responsibility for the attack.
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