The pattern of Marriott Hotel suicide bombing in Islamabad points to the possible involvement of the Harkatul Jehadul Islami (HuJI)
LAHORE: The pattern of Marriott Hotel suicide bombing in Islamabad points to the possible involvement of the Harkatul Jehadul Islami (HuJI) led by Qari Saifullah Akhtar and not the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan headed by Commander Baitullah Mehsud, which has been held responsible by the law enforcement agencies for most of the recent suicide bombings across Pakistan.
The pattern of the attack and the nature of explosives used resemble four previous vehicle bomb attacks carried out by suicide bombers in Rawalpindi, Lahore and Islamabad.
The suicide bombers used different types of vehicles in these four attacks, which were laden with high intensity explosives to hit their targets. The investigators have concluded that the material used was a mix of Cyclotrimethylenetrinitramine or RDX and Trinitrotoluene or TNT explosives.
While the RDX is used as a major component of many plastic bonded explosives to multiply their intensity, the TNT is usually used to shatter concrete structures and hillocks. A similar mix of explosives had been used in four earlier attacks in Rawalpindi, Islamabad and Lahore.
The bombings had been carried out by an al-Qaeda linked jehadi group — Harkatul Jehadul Islami, following the arrest of its ameer Qari Saifullah Akhtar from the Ferozwala area close to Lahore in February 2007. As a matter of fact, six suspected militants of the HuJI, who had been arrested after the March 4 Naval War College suicide attack, were being kept at the regional headquarters of the FIA in Lahore and being grilled by a joint investigation team of several intelligence agencies called SIA.
The investigators believed that these suicide attacks were actually meant to pressurise the government over the February 26, 2006 arrest of Qari Saifullah in connection with the October 18, 2007 suicide attack on the welcome procession of Benazir Bhutto in Karachi that killed over 140 people.
On March 15, four days after the FIA headquarters attack, terrorists targeted an Islamabad restaurant by hitting the place with a powerful explosive device, killing a Turkish woman and injuring over a dozen Americans.
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