Suspected female suicide bomber arrested in Pakistan’s Balochistan

Quetta, Feb 19 (PTI) Pakistani security forces arrested a woman with a jacket laden with explosives who was planning to carry out a suicide attack in the Balochistan province, police said on Sunday.

The suspect, identified as Mahbal, was arrested on Saturday in Quetta’s Satellite Town, a Counter Terrorism Department (CTD) official of the Balochistan police said.

“The woman was arrested on an intelligence tip-off, and a suicide jacket with explosives was also recovered from her bag,” the official said.

He said the woman, affiliated to the outlawed insurgent Baloch Liberation Front (BLF), was sent to Quetta for allegedly carrying out a suicide attack.

“The woman was arrested from near a park in Quetta’s Satellite Town when teams of CTD and intelligence agencies conducted an operation in the area against the outlawed Baloch Liberation Front,” the CTD official said.

“She had a bag with the suicide jacket that had four to five kilograms of explosives on it,” he said.

“We got an intelligence tip-off that the BLF had sent a suicide bomber to carry out an attack on a key installation in Quetta. We have identified her as Mahbal, wife of Bebagar alias Nadeem,” he added.

Last year in April, a female suicide bomber of the banned Balochistan National Army (BLA) carried out a suicide attack at the Karachi University’s Confucius Institute entrance, killing three Chinese teachers and their Pakistani driver.

The arrest comes days after a deadly attack by Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) militants on the Karachi Police Chief’s head office on Friday, which killed seven people, including three terrorists and as many security personnel.

Security forces managed to kill the terrorists and clear the building after nearly four hours, with the help of police and paramilitary rangers.

After security lapses emerged as the cause for the TTP terrorists’ successful entry into the building, the Inspector General of Sindh Police formed a committee of top-ranking police officials to probe into the incident and supervise the investigation of the case.