The Hindu : `Extremist network behind attack on Musharraf'

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Sunday, Dec 28, 2003

International

International

`Extremist network behind attack on Musharraf'

By B. Muralidhar Reddy

ISLAMABAD Dec. 27 . Pakistan has claimed that a network of local and foreign extremists were behind the latest attempt, second in a fortnight, to assassinate its President, Pervez Musharraf.

The Pakistan Information and Broadcasting Minister, Sheikh Rashid Ahmed, told correspondents today that it was only a matter of time before investigators closed in on the network.

However, he did not give details of the network or its spread within Pakistan. On Friday, the Pakistan Interior Minister, Faisal Saleh Hayat, had told Parliament that the identity of the two suicide bombers involved in the attack on Gen. Musharraf had been established. The Information Minister had said that the slain attackers appeared to be foreigners.

Unconfirmed reports said that the authorities had taken 40 suspects into custody in connection with the attack. However, there did not appear to be any breakthrough in the case of the first attack on Gen. Musharraf on December 14. Using a remote control device, an attempt was made to blow up a bridge on which the President's convoy passed. It is believed that the jammer in the General's security apparatus saved his life.

In the second attack on Thursday, two terrorists tried to ram explosives-laden vehicles into the General's convoy just 200 yards from the spot where the first incident took place.

Alarm bells went off in the Pakistani establishment as an explosion in a mill in Rawalpindi town late on Friday caused five deaths. It was initially feared that it was a bomb explosion. As private television networks began flashing the news and confusion spread, Government directed the Information Minister to clarify that it was an accident. ``The fire was accidental and there has been no terrorist activity'', police told journalists later.

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