KARACHI: The Counter-Terrorism Department on Monday claimed to have arrested an ‘important commander’ of the banned Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (Buner district) who was allegedly involved in attacks on security forces and generating funds for terror.

Acting on a tip-off, the CTD arrested the suspect, Rehmat Ali Shah, in City Railway Colony, said CTD SSP (Investigation) Junaid Ahmed Shaikh.

During an initial probe, the arrested TTP suspect ‘confessed’ to his involvement in several acts of terrorism.

The suspect with 10 to 15 other TTP militants attacked a police post with a bomb in the Buner district in 2009.

He with 40 to 50 TTP militants attacked and captured an FC camp in Buner district in the same year, which remained under their control for one month before it was vacated after the army operation there.

Rehmat was also involved in killing one person in Buner over suspicion of being an ‘informer’. Besides, he had been generating funds for the banned outfits of TTP and Lashkar-i-Jhangvi in Karachi since 2009.

The CTD official said the TTP militant had fled from his native place in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa after launching of the army operation and has been hiding at different places in the metropolis before being arrested.

Path to militancy

Rehmat was born in Buner in 1987 and studied up to the primary level. Later on, he memorised the holy Quran at a seminary.

From 2004 to 2009, he remained a prayer leader and moved to Karachi in 2009 along with his family when the army launched operation in Swat.

He then completed some courses of religion at a seminary in Karachi and started running his own seminary in the city, revealed CTD Additional IG Dr Sanaullah Abbasi.

The AIG told Dawn that the held militant had joined the TTP in 2008 when he was a prayer leader.

Later on, he started recruiting youngsters for the outfit.

The TTP militant told investigators that he carried out attacks on security forces in order to impose conservative code of life.

Rehmat added that he had beheaded the ‘informer’ near a roundabout in Buner and threatened the people who gathered over there that anybody who went against the TTP would have to bear the same fate.

The arrested TTP militant had been declared absconder in those cases by the Anti-Terrorism Court-V of the Buner district.

Published in Dawn, June 5th, 2018