JuD headquarters sealed, crackdown continues

Pakistan authorities on Thursday sealed the Lahore headquarters of Hafiz Saeed-led Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD) and its charity wing Falah-i-Insaniat Foundation (FIF) as part of the ongoing crackdown against the banned organisations.

“Under the National Action Plan (NAP), the government hastaken complete control of the banned JuD and FIF headquarters in Lahore andMuridkey,” said a statement issued by the Punjab Home department Thursday.

   

It said the government has been taking over the control ofthe mosques, seminaries and other institutions of the banned organisations inthe province.

“We have intensified action against the bannedorganisations,” it said.

A senior government official told PTI that the authoritieshave sealed the Jamia Masjid Qadsia, the Lahore headquarters of the JuD andFIF.

The official said the government has also taken over thecomplete control of the JuD headquarters in Muridke, some 40-km from Lahore.However, the home department did not confirm it.

The official further said that Saeed and his supporters didnot protest when the administration and police reached there to take over thecontrol of the building.

“Saeed along with his supporters left for his Jauhar Townresidence,” he said. The whereabouts of Saeed was immediately not known.

Saeed was listed under UN Security Council Resolution 1267in December 2008. He was released from house arrest in Pakistan in November2017.

According to officials, JuD’s network includes 300seminaries and schools, hospitals, a publishing house and ambulance service.The two groups have about 50,000 volunteers and hundreds of other paid workers.

Meanwhile, a total of 121 members of the proscribed groupshave so far been taken into “preventive detention” across Pakistan,the Interior Ministry announced Thursday.

The new figure of 121 came two days after the ministry saidJaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) chief Masood Azhar’s son and brother were among 44members of the banned militant outfits taken into “preventivedetention”.

Ministry of Interior Secretary AzamSuleman Khan said onTuesday that HamadAzhar and Mufti Abdul Raoof were among those detained. Hamadis the son of Masood Azhar while Raoof is his brother.

In a notification, the Interior Ministry said the provincialgovernments have taken over the management and administrative control of 182madaris, 34 schools/ colleges as part of the National Action Plan (NAP) to”combat terrorism.”

The Ministry of Interior said law enforcement agencies hadtaken 121 people into preventive detention as of Thursday in compliance withthe NAP, formulated after the attack on an army school in Peshawar in 2014 thatkilled nearly 150 people, mostly students.

Provincial governments across Pakistan have also taken overfive hospitals, 163 dispensaries, 184 ambulances and eight offices, Geo Newsquoted the notification as saying.

Meanwhile, Information Minister Fawad Chaudhry said thegovernment has decided that it will decide on its larger strategy on how to actagainst proscribed organisations after discussing the matter with otherparliamentary leaders.

Addressing a press conference, he said that the leaders ofmajor parties will be taken into confidence on major decisions on bannedorganisations in the country.

Chaudhry said that a consensus had been built in the countryin recent days in response to the “Indian aggression” and thegovernment wanted this consensus to be sustained rather than see it break”over small things”.

He said that these were matters of national interest and the government wanted to move forward with the Opposition, similar to the way it had with various other institutions.

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