Key Taliban commander arrested

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan 

Adnan Rasheed, a key Pakistani Taliban commander who is said to be the mastermind of several terrorist attacks in Pakistan, has been arrested in South Waziristan on Friday, according to officials.

An intelligence official detailed in the region, and requesting not to be named, told Anadolu Agency that Rasheed, an ex-air force commander, who was reportedly injured, had been arrested from the Shakai area of South Waziristan - a former stronghold of Pakistani Taliban’s mother organization Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) after he tried to escape an army siege on Miranshah, the administrative headquarters of North Waziristan last week.

“However, security forces who had been continuously pursuing him, arrested him from the Shakai valley in South Waziristan four days ago”, the official claimed but declined to confirm whether he was seriously injured. 

Rasheed, a firebrand commander, joined the Pakistan Air Force in 1997 as a technician at the age of 17, and was arrested by the intelligence agency in 2004 on charges of masterminding a suicide attack on former military dictator General Pervez Musharraf in the garrison city of Rawalpindi. He was reported by various sources killed by airstrikes by Pakistani security sources on 21 January 2014.

An anti-terrorist court convicted Rasheed in 2005, and sentenced him to death. He, however, managed to flee from Bannu jail (adjoining district of North Waziristan) in 2012 in a major jail break along with 348 of his comrades.

Intelligence sources say that after fleeing from Bannu jail, Rasheed moved to North Waziristan, and took command of a TTP section responsible for planning and executing terrorist attacks on Pakistani security forces and government installations.

“This is the biggest catch in the ongoing military operation (in North Waziristan),” the intelligence official said adding that Rasheed had been shifted to an unknown location for interrogation.

Rasheed also lead an organization “Aseer-ul-Mujahiddin” (detained Mujahiddin) whose aim is to set militants free from the custody of security forces, the official said.

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