The Pakistani security agencies on Thursday arrested a foreign national in connection with the car bomb blast outside the house of the 2008 Mumbai terror attack mastermind and chief of banned Jamat-ud-Dawa (JuD) Hafiz Saeed in Lahore.
As per Dawn newspaper, the suspect has been identified as Peter Paul David. He was reportedly arrested from the Lahore airport on Thursday.
David was offloaded from a Karachi-bound flight and taken to an undisclosed location for questioning, reported Duniya TV.
The report in Dawn suggested that David is the owner of the car used in the blast on Wednesday morning.
It added that the travel history of David shows that the foreign national had been shuttling between Karachi, Lahore and Dubai regularly. He reportedly failed to satisfy the investigators about the purpose of these visits and his activities.
Three persons were killed and 21 others left injured when an explosives-laden car exploded outside Saeed’s residence at the Board of Revenue (BOR) Housing Society in Lahore’s Johar Town earlier this week. No group has claimed responsibility for the blast so far.
The report also said that the law enforcement agencies were on the lookout for another suspect, who reportedly drove the car to the targeted location.
Initial investigation has suggested that the car used in the blast was stolen in 2010 from Gujranwala in Punjab province and since then, the vehicle had been sold multiple times. David was reportedly its last owner.
As per an official, intelligence agencies traced the location of the car’s owner with the help of its registration record that was obtained from the excise department. David was then held from the Lahore airport.
The official, while quoting the initial probe, said that the car entered Lahore from Babu Sabu interchange a few hours prior to the blast. Police personnel had cleared the vehicle and the driver after checking.
He also mentioned conflicting reports about whether the car, at the time of the checking, was carrying explosives or not. However, there is a probability that it was fitted with explosives inside Lahore and then taken to Johar Town.
According to the CCTV footage, a masked suspect parked the car at the corner of a street near Saeed’s residence at around 10:40 am on Wednesday. He exited the car and then vanished. The blast took place at around 11:10 am. The suspect had reportedly carried out the blast with a timed device.
One of the footages gathered from around the spot shows that the driver was picked up from a petrol pump nearby by an accomplice in a car.
The official further said that David has denied his involvement in the blast during interrogation. The foreign national told the investigators that during his last visit to Dubai, one of his friends said someone he knew in Gujranwala needed David’s car for a few days.
He handed over the car to a masked man in Gujranwala after his return to Pakistan from Dubai, said David, adding that he thought the man was wearing the mask due to COVID-19.
Interior Minister Sheikh Rashid Ahmed had on Thursday claimed that the Punjab Police were close to nabbing the culprits responsible for the blast in Lahore.
