As many as 232 policemen and 27 Rangers have been killed in the line of duty since the beginning of the Karachi operation on September 5, 2013, Karachi Police AIG Mushtaq Maher told media on Saturday.In around 3,000 encounters, some 282 terrorists were killed, 38 kidnappers and 10 extortionists were arrested, and 15,400 weapons and several bulletproof jackets, rocket launchers and hand grenades were seized.He went on to add that car-snatching incidents reported in the city were at their lowest in the past 15 years while motorcycle-snatching incidents were on the rise.And while terror-related incidents have been reduced up to 60 per cent in the two years since the commencement of the Karachi operation, Maher added that sleeper cells of the banned outfits still exist in some areas nurturing terrorists. The Karachi operation needs to be further finessed if the terrorist menace is to be decisively rooted out. Sleeper cells are a means whereby terrorist organisations make space for themselves in a society; these organisations also create sleeper cells as a survival strategy when they are under threat, such as in Karachi at present.Because these sub-units consist of a few individuals — who sometimes seem to lead ostensibly ‘ordinary’ lives — and maintain only minimal links with their parent organisation, they can be difficult to detect. Their ability to inflict harm, however, is formidable, especially when they work in tandem with other cells. The teeming urban enclaves and chaotic labyrinth of unregulated settlements on the city outskirts that were a reservoir for criminality until the operation began in September 2013, possibly still offer refuge to such offshoots and the remnants of the terrorism infrastructure from which they draw sustenance. Top-drawer intelligence is the only way to eliminate the threat that they pose. Notwithstanding the culpability of some elements in the provincial political set-up, it could also be argued that the Rangers-led operation has spread itself too thin by venturing into the domain of white-collar corruption rather than focusing single-mindedly on eliminating terrorist groups.
pk.shafaqna.com
