March 27th, 2016: The Lahore Carnage and the Capital Riots
The nation watched in horror as terrorist attack left more than 70 dead in Lahore park
Dunya News Report (Talha Ul Huda)
The figurative yet very literal heart of the country was drenched in blood as a suicide bomber blew himself up, taking away 74 innocent lives and injuring at least 300 people, who were at the Gulshan-Iqbal park celebrating the Easter holiday and for general recreational purposes. The jovial background froze into itself and a carnage erupted; dead bodies and rubble, the injured writhing in pain and a sight of utter chaos.
Paramedics and contingency forces rushed to the scene and a conformed mass hysteria was experienced amongst the general public. The citizens of Lahore rushed to the hospitals to donate blood, and a large number of volunteers arrived on the incident to aid the emergency forces.
Almost 20 of the dead bodies were identified to be Christian citizens, who were at the park to celebrate Easter. This blast was the deadliest in the recent history of Lahore, surpassing the Wagah Border incident, when two suicide bombers took lives of 55 tourists and border security forces personnel as a flag-raising ceremony was underway.
The incident was mourned over all across the country; the Nation watched in horror and with aggrieved hearts. Prominent political leaders, Government and Army officials condemned the attack and vowed to not back down until the last terrorist is eliminated off the Pakistani soil.
While Lahore bled, the federal capital was under attack by religious fanatics. The very same day, observing the 40th day following the execution of Mumtaz Qadri, the man who murdered Salman Taseer in 2011, religious groups protesting the execution erupted on the streets of the capital and vandalized public properties, attacked buildings and injured innocent citizens. The capital police reacted by first setting up blockades between the twin cities of Islamabad and Rawalpindi to protect the citizens, cellular services were suspended to cut off communication between the rioters and to prevent them from calling out backup. Islamabad Capital Police personnel abstained from the use of force and a riot-protocol was followed; verbal warnings followed by tear-gas to disband the rioters. The miscreants vandalized a metro-bus station in the red-zone, and created unrest in the diplomatic enclave. The situation has been controlled by the Capital security forces but imminent threats for another wave of hostility linger over the capital. ICT has been prepared for contingency; Rangers and Police battalions have been assembled in the parade ground to control any unfavorable situation in the days to come.
Multiple Anjuman Tulba Islam (ATI) protestors were arrested as they attacked the Karachi press club. These miscreants resorted to aerial firing, assaulting journalists and also set a vehicle belonging to a private television channel on fire.
At the directives of the Chief Of Army Staff General Raheel Sharif, a full scale operation has been launched throughout Punjab. This operation will be conducted across all districts of the province to single out terrorist elements and to root out all their activities.
Suspected terrorists were arrested from all over the country in sting operations upon identifications and go-aheads from Intelligence agencies. According to an ISPR release, more than five large scale sting operations have been conducted across the cities of Lahore, Faisalabad and Multan since the Gulshan-Iqbal tragedy. A large quantity of explosives was also discovered and taken custody of, in a raid conducted by the Karachi police in North Nazimabad.
A high-level military assemblage took place in the General Headquarters which was presided over by the Chief of Army Staff. This meeting was attended by the Director Generals of Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and Military Intelligence (MI). The Army Chief directed the intelligence officials to locate the bases of the clandestine usurp operations in this recent wave of insurgency. The Director General ISPR Lt. Gen Asim Bajwa, in a press release said that the Army Chief has stressed over the importance of retaliating to the Lahore-massacre with effective aggression.
This chain of unfortunate events is speculated to have been linked with the recent capture of a RAW official by the intelligence agencies. Analysts are of the opinion that the Indian intelligence agency might have retaliated to the capture and detention of Commander Yadav. These speculations have been backed up by the disclosure of RAW’s involvement in insurgent activities through Iranian soil by the Pakistani COAS, while expressing these concerns to the Iranian president Rouahani on his visit to Pakistan on March 26th.
