PESHAWAR: Founder of the outlawed Lashkar-i-Islam, Mufti Munir Shakir succumbed to his injuries he sustained in a blast in Peshawar on Saturday.
According to a statement from the Peshawar Police spokesperson, the blast took place outside a mosque in the precincts of Urmur Police Station.
“Initially Mufti Shakir was injured on his left foot in the blast along with three others, identified as Khushal, Abid and Syed Nabi”, the spokesperson said.
Following the blast, the police personnel along with the bomb disposal unit and Counter-Terrorism Department reached the scene and collected evidence, the statement said.
Mohammad Asim, the spokesman for the Lady Reading Hospital (LRH), confirmed to the media that Mufti Shakir who was brought to LRH in critical condition and succumbed to his injuries.”
Meanwhile, Special Assistant to Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Chief Minister on Health Ehtesham Ali in a statement said he was “deeply saddened” to hear of the development.
Lashkar-i-Islam — a Bara-based militant organisation in Khyber tribal region led by Mangal Bagh — was banned in 2008.
A local cleric in Bara, Mufti Shakir formed the Lashkar-i-Islam in December 2004 after Sipah and Malikdinkhel tribesmen announced their full allegiance to him. However, the cleric was expelled from Bar Qambarkhel area after only six months owing to his extremist views and differences with Haji Namdar, another militant commander of the area.
Both Mufti Shakir and Pir Saifur Rehman were forced to leave Bara after a jirga of local elders gave a consensus verdict following bloody clashes between the supporters of the two in early 2005. Mangal Bagh, a bus driver-turned-militant was elevated to the position of amir (chief) of Lashkar-i-Islam in May 2005.
Pakistani security forces demolished the house of Haji Rabat and destroyed the FM radio station set up in a mosque after they started the first military operation against Lashkar-i-Islam in mid-2005.
