Senior Al Qaida ‘commander’ killed near Pak-Afghan border

Security forces claimed to have killed the al Qaeda chief of Balochistan and South Punjab, Omar Abdul Latif (alias Luqman), in Balochistan’s Chaghi district near the Pak-Afghan border on Sunday.

“An important Al-Qaeda commander – namely Umar Lateef, a Pakistani national – was killed in an encounter with local security agencies”, provincial home minister Sarfraz Bugti told AFP.

Umar Lateef had established an al Qaeda network and was supervising its “terrorist activities and providing travel and logistical facilities to terrorists in both Balochistan and south Punjab as well as in Afghanistan”, he added.

Acting on a tip off, the security forces had conducted an operation during which the wife of the al Qaeda militant commander was also arrested.

The wife of the Al Qaida commander was identified as Tayyaba alias Freeha Baji and Latif’s two children were also taken into custody for interrogation, Bugti said. “His brother Bilal succeeded in escaping during the raid, probably to neighbouring Afghanistan”.

Latif was trying to set up an al-Qaeda base camp and carry out terror attacks in the province and other parts of Pakistan, the Minister said.

His wife is being interrogated by security officials.

“He was linked to the subcontinent chapter of the al-Qaeda”, he said.

The Pakistani army started an operation against pro-Taliban and al-Qaeda-affiliated militants in the northwestern tribal regions of Pakistan in June last year after a deadly raid on the Karachi worldwide Airport ended the government’s faltering peace talks with the pro-Taliban militants.