Eight-hour gunbattle

LAHORE - Terror hit the city second time in a month when heavily armed men, numbering about 10, took hold of the Manawan Police training centre in an eight-hour long gun-battle which climaxed into the killing of eight policemen and capturing alive of 4 terrorists on Monday morning. Above 90 other policemen were also injured in the attack which revealed that the inside situation was much serious.
The bloody attack took place at 7:30 am when first batch of over 900 newly-recruited police constables was in the middle of its morning drill. The terrorists first lobbed grenades towards the police and then opened indiscriminate firing on the fleeing policemen.
Another episode of the incident was the successful commando operation of the Rangers and the Elite Force officials who first took positions on the roofs of the nearby buildings and then entered the Police Training Centre. Some of the commandos entered the premises through the gun-fitted police vans to join the operation against terrorists. The villagers and other police jawans later celebrated the successful operation by raising slogans in favour of police and Rangers.
During the attack, terrorists also made several police constables hostage.
It was a second high-profile incident in a month if we include an attack on the bus carrying Sri Lankan team, killing 8 policemen while injuring six Sri Lankan players.
The news of killing spree and terrorists' hold on one of the city's major police training centres, spread like a wild fire causing panic among local residents and the city police high ups.
Modus operandi of the assailants was almost the same as was adopted by the armed men who had attacked the Sri Lankan team at Liberty Chowk as all of them were carrying backpacks full of weapons, the experts said. There was also similarity of the timings and the day as both high profile incidents had occurred on Monday morning, they said. The injured police constables said that the armed men were talking in Pushto and Punjabi.
A batch of 910 newly-recruited police constables was getting training at the Manawan training centre, a senior official of the centre said. They had arrived from different districts of the province and joined the departmental course a month back only and were unarmed and untrained.
Inspector General of Police (IGP) Punjab Kahwaja Khalid Farooq confirmed the death of eight people including five policemen and three civilians in the terrorists' attack and injuries to 87 others. He however claimed that only one terrorist was arrested.
Medical Superintendent Mayo Hospital, Dr Zahid Pervez, said eight bodies of the policemen were received at the city morgue of the hospital for postmortum examination.
Edhi spokesman claimed 13 persons including three civilians were killed while over 90 injured in the Manawan armed attack.
The officials of the law enforcement agencies however claimed that four terrorists have been arrested during commandos operation, which continued for eight hours. They later shifted them to undisclosed places for interrogation. One of them, who seemed to be an Afghan national, was arrested outside the police training school. A joint team comprising special commandos of Rangers, Elite force and the Punjab police took part in the operation.
A police instructor, who was present in the training centre, told The Nation that five hours after the attack, the terrorists confined themselves in a room at the third floor of the centre and ended their lives by blowing themselves up in order to avert arrests when commandos operation was in progress.
He claimed that no arrest was made during or after the commando operation, as he was privy to all the developments from morning till the completion of the commando operation.
"I saw bodies of unknown terrorists torn into pieces in the room when I visited the site along with the commandos during operation", he said. At that time when he was present in a room at ground floor along with some other policemen he heard two blasts sound coming from the upper portion of the building at around 2:30pm. The law enforcement agencies also recovered some bullet-riddled bodies of the cops after the operation.
Quoting two residents, a senior police investigator said a group of around 11 armed men reached the K.C colony on Monday morning on a van which dropped them some 100 yards away from the targeted training centre. The officer said that the terrorists took advantage of the boundary wall of the Manwan Training Centre, which was only three feet high from the K.C Colony side.
They entered the premises of the Centre quite easily by scaling over walls and started operation without giving any chance to insiders.
The police officer said soon after throwing hand grenades on the policemen gathered in the ground for training, the intruders dispersed to three sides and continued firing by taking positions.
In the start some policemen offered resistance by retaliating the firing but to no avail, as they had no sufficient ammunition at that time. The terrorists later targeted the policemen while they were fleeing helter-skelter for shelter.
The armed men killed or injured some of the police officials while chasing them to the barracks.
He said the highly-trained terrorists, armed with lethal weapons including hand grenades, resorted to heavy firing on the empty-handed under-training policemen when they were attending general parade at around 7:30am at the ground of the centre.
Safdar Ali, an injured constable, admitted to the Services Hospital, said he was present in the general parade, which had almost come to an end when the armed men attacked them from three sides. He along with his other colleagues immediately rushed to the barracks. The armed men however, targeted the panicked policemen when they were running towards hostels to seek shelter and to save their lives. The terrorists chased many of them and shot several police officials dead while injuring scores of others, he said.
"It was impossible for the under-training and empty-handed policemen to challenge the well-trained terrorists who were armed with sophisticated weapons", he said and added that he rushed to his barrack along with some other colleagues and confined themselves in the room by locking the door from inside.
Another under-training police constable, Ijaz Ahmad, said he saw six to eight armed terrorists who entered the training centre by scaling over boundary walls from K.C Colony side. The intruders first killed two police constables deployed there for security purpose and then entered the Manawan Centre premises.
The terrorists carrying modern guns continued firing for some hours and later went to the third floor of the building where they hid themselves. He said some armed men opened firing from two other sides.
The Rescue 1122, Edhi and officials of other agencies rushed to the spot and shifted the injured to the public as well as private hospitals of the city.
Sources said that one of the arrested terrorists has been identified as 23-year-old Hijrat Khan, an afghan national. The bearded terrorist was wearing shalwar kameez. The police also recovered hand grenades and a knife from his possession.
Eyewitnesses said the terrorist was running toward a military helicopter to explode it when the Ranger officials managed to capture him.
Meanwhile, Advisor to Prime Minister on Interior, Rehman Malik, told the newsmen Police sources said that law enforcement agencies recovered a huge cache of weapons from the centre that was brought in sports bags by the terrorists.
Seven bags carrying hand grenades, small weapons and a large number of bullets were also found from the centre.
Samples of the fired and live bullets, hand grenades and other weapons used by the terrorists have been sent to the laboratory for analysis, a police official said.
Deputy Medical Superintendent (DMS) Mayo Hospital, Dr Aleem Ahmad, said that he received heads, legs and arms of three alleged terrorists at the city morgue late on Monday night.
"They seem to be young including an Afghan national", he said and added that their bodies were torn into pieces.
To a query, Dr Aleem said that postmortem of eight policemen, who were martyred in the attack, was in progress.
Agencies add: Two hand grenades, a dagger and a passport have been recovered from the alleged terrorist arrested from near Police Training Centre, Manawan here on Monday.
The number of terrorists was about 20, Ranger sources said and added that the accused also fired shots at helicopters, which were on a surveillance mission at the police training school but the pilots managed to get their machines out of the danger zone.