Jihadi militants target 40 mosques in Pak in recent years

Jihadi groups have attacked or destroyed at least 40 mosques in Pakistan in recent years, killing hundreds of worshippers, a move that is being dubbed by a former Indian envoy as "random terrorism".

The strategy of targeting mosques at prayer time is now increasingly being used by terrorist groups across Pakistan as this has become a lethal way to create terror.

According to the available data, about 40 mosques have been targeted either by Taliban or other terror groups like Sipah-e-Sahaba (SS), Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ) and Jaish-e- Mohammad (JeM) since 2002 across Pakistan with four being attacked this year so far.

"This is random terrorism," former Indian high commissioner to Pakistan G Parthasarthy said, when asked about the attack on religious places in the neighbouring country.

Taliban wants to spread their extremist Deoband brand of Islam which is different from what people in India follow. They have aligned with a number of Sunni extremist groups like SS, LeJ and JeM, the former Indian high commissioner to Pakistan said.

Former diplomat Satish Chandra says there is lot of sectarian violence in Pakistan mainly fomented by the Taliban.

The recent in the series was the April five attack on a mosque in Punjab's Chakwal town which claimed 30 lives. On March 27, a suicide bomber blew himself up in a mosque packed with worshippers in Jamrud in NWFP killing 76 people and reducing the roadside mosque to rubble.

On February five, over 32 people were killed when a suicide bomber blew himself up amidst a crowd of worshippers outside Al Hussainia Mosque in Dera Ghazi Khan in Punjab. So far over 200 people have been killed in the attacks on mosques this year.

"Taliban has killed thousands of Shias in Afghanistan and these groups in Pakistan are doing similar things against Shias and Sunni Barelvi Muslims to create terror," Parthasarthy said.

Pakistan's Interior Minitry chief Rehman Malik has said in the past that al-Qaeda has been using the LeJ and SS to execute terrorist attacks in Pakistan.

Muslim clerics have also condemned the attacks on mosques and other religios shrines, saying Islam never permits such acts and these acts are "un-Islamic".

Islamic scholar and Jamiat-Ulema-e-Hind spokesman Maulana Abdul Hameed Nomani said, "A true Muslim can never target a religious shrine. This kind of acts are inhumane and the culprits must be punished."

"This is un-Islamic act," he said.

All India Muslim Personal Law Board vice president and Islamic scholar Maulana Kalbe Sadiq said: "Those who carry out such attacks doesn't deserve to be called Muslims."

"Such acts are against the basic Islamic principles," he said and questioned the silence of Muslim leaders.

"When Babri Mosque was demolished, there was hue and cry everywhere but why the same people are now silent when mosques are being destroyed and innocents are being killed?" Sadiq asked.

In 2008, the mosques were targeted on 12 occasions with major being in Tull tehsil of NWFP, in Badan village of Bajaur Agency and in Maskanai area of lower Dir in NWFP. Over 80 people were killed in these attacks.

In 2007, over half a dozen mosques were targeted in which more than 100 people were killed.

The major attack was near Qasim Ali Khan Mosque in the Dilgaran area of Qissa Khawani Bazaar in Peshawar which claimed 15 lives in January. In December, over 50 people were killed when a suicide bomber blew himself up in the midst of worshippers offering Id-ul-Adha prayers in Charsadda in NWFP.

In 2005, the major terror attack took place in May in which 25 people, including suicide bomber, were killed at the Bari Imam shrine located in vicinity of the diplomatic enclave in Islamabad.

In 2004, around 100 worshippers were killed in more than half a dozen attacks on mosques in Karachi, Sialkot, Lahore and other cities.

In 2003, five major attacks were reported including the strikes on a mosque in Quetta, capital of Balochistan, that killed at least 53 people.

In 2002, a chief cleric at a Karachi mosque was killed in the attack on the complex.