RAWALPINDI: The Inter Services Public Relations (ISPR) department of the Pakistan Army has announced that a “complex clearance operation” at a Frontier Corps’ (FC) facility in Muslim Bagh area of Qilla Saifullah, northern Balochistan, was “completed” in the early hours of May 13 (today). The ISPR said the operation also involved a hostage rescue operation “to save three families, including children, from a residential block”.
“During the clearance operation, seven sons of the soil, including a civilian, embraced martyrdom (Shahadat) while another six individuals, including a woman, have been injured,” the ISPR statement read.
Earlier, the ISPR had informed the media that two terrorists had been ‘neutralised’ while two soldiers had rendered the ultimate sacrifice. The toll has now climbed to six dead terrorists, and six security forces’ personnel killed in action, as well as one civilian dead. Source reports claimed the toll was much higher, alleging that over a dozen soldiers had been martyred while more than 40 troops were wounded while fighting terrorists at the Muslim Bagh facility.
In the earlier report, the ISPR also announced that Commander XII Corps, Lt Gen Asif Ghafoor, was supervising the security forces’ operations at Muslim Bagh in Balochistan “where the terrorists have been cornered into a building complex”.
The clearance operation at the paramilitary FC’s compound or ammunition dump in Muslim Bagh had formally commenced on the evening of May 12 (Friday), after military sources said forces present on site “repulsed the initial onslaught of terrorists” sometime during the early hours of Friday.
“All six terrorists in the compound, who were well equipped, have been sent to hell,” the ISPR boasts. It also states that necessary intelligence operations will follow up the operation in order to trace and arrest terror facilitators and “expose their sponsors”.
The Tehreek-e-Jihad Pakistan (TJP) issued claims of responsibility for the attack, and also released pictures on social media of militants who they claimed were attacking the FC compound. The TJP earlier claimed to be behind an attack on a counterterrorism department (CTD) compound – also presumed to be an ammunition storage facility – in Kabal, Swat late last month.
Authorities have yet to officially comment on these claims, or the emergence of new terrorist organizations in a country already battling resurgent militant groups like the banned Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and Baloch separatists.
May 12,2023
Source: The Friday Times