By IANS,
London : Security officials in Pakistan are focusing on the possible involvement of two terrorist groups other than the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) in the recent armed attack on Sri Lankan cricketers in Lahore, a newspaper said Sunday.
Pakistani authorities now privately admit that the attack was home-grown, and are investigating not only the LeT, the militant group that was originally set up by the ISI intelligence service, but also the Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ) and Jaish-e-Mohammed, the Sunday Times reported.
With dried fruit, nuts, power bars and energy drinks having been found in the attackers’ rucksacks, the paper said one theory being investigated is that the terrorists may have been planning to take the cricketers hostage.
It said LeJ bombed a Karachi hotel where the New Zealand cricket team was staying in 2002, and that both LeJ and Jaish were promoted by the ISI to fight in Kashmir in the 1990s and trigger sectarian violence against Shi’ites, providing the excuse to impose military rule in Pakistan.
“Lots of groups have come up in the last 10 years and we don’t know who’s controlling who or what group is under whose control,” former Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif told The Sunday Times.
“This is the tragedy. We just don’t know,” he added.