LAHORE: Pakistani officials said Sunday that four extremists allegedly involved in a 2009 attack on the visiting Sri Lankan cricket team were killed in a shootout with police.
The attack on the cricket team killed six police and two bystanders, and wounded six cricket players. The Pakistani Taliban and Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, an affiliated extremist group, claimed the attack, which was carried out by 10 gunmen.
The shootout erupted late Saturday on the edge of Lahore when other gunmen tried to break the militants out of police custody, a counterterrorism official said. Another senior official confirmed the account. Both spoke on condition of anonymity, fearing retribution.
Pakistan has stepped up its fight against extremist groups over the past two years, including with a military offensive in North Waziristan, a tribal region near the Afghan border and longtime stronghold of Al-Qaeda and other militants.
On Sunday, security forces raided a religious seminary on the outskirts of the southwestern city of Quetta, where a suicide bomber killed more than 70 people earlier this month, and sealed it when they found nearly 100 illegal Afghan immigrants residing there, provincial government spokesman Anwarul Haq said.
Other such raids netted another 228 Afghans, said paramilitary spokesman Khan Wasey. It was unclear if the raids were linked to terrorism suspicions.
Quetta is the capital of the southwestern Baluchistan province, which has long been the scene of a low-level insurgency by separatists groups. Extremist groups also operate in the region. Six alleged recruiters for Al-Qaeda and the Daesh group have been arrested in the province in recent days, according to provincial home minister Sarfaz Bugti.
Four extremists behind 2009 cricket attack killed: Pakistan
Four extremists behind 2009 cricket attack killed: Pakistan
UK granted permission to appeal ruling that Palestine Action ban was unlawful
- London’s High Court ruled this month that the ban was unlawful
- The same court on Wednesday granted Britain’s Home Office interior ministry permission to challenge its ruling
LONDON: The British government was on Wednesday given permission to appeal against a ruling that its ban on pro-Palestinian campaign group Palestine Action as a terrorist organization was unlawful.
Palestine Action was proscribed in July, having increasingly taken “direct action” against Israel-linked defense companies in Britain, often blocking entrances or spraying red paint.
Palestine Action was banned shortly after a June break-in at the Royal Air Force’s Brize Norton air base, in which activists damaged two planes, an action described by Prime Minister Keir Starmer as “disgraceful.”
Lawyers representing Huda Ammori, who co-founded Palestine Action in 2020, argued at a hearing last year that the move was an authoritarian restriction on the right to protest.
London’s High Court ruled this month that the ban was unlawful, ruling that it was a disproportionate interference with free speech rights.
The same court on Wednesday granted Britain’s Home Office interior ministry permission to challenge its ruling, saying the ban would remain in place pending the appeal.
The Home Office said it was pleased it could appeal.
“We will always take the strongest possible action to protect our national security and our priority remains maintaining the safety and security of our citizens,” a spokesperson said in a statement.
The ruling earlier this month threw into question the prosecution of hundreds of people who had been charged for holding signs in support of the group, and prompted London’s Metropolitan Police to say it would focus on gathering evidence rather than making arrests.
