Mastermind of Attack on Sri Lankan Cricket Team has just been judicially executed

Courtesy of Sunday Times, … http://www.sundaytimes.lk/141221/news/hanged-kingpin-in-attack-at-lahore-on-lankan-cricket-team-128194.html, where the title is “Hanged: Kingpin in attack at Lahore on Lankan cricket team”

Aqeel Ahmad alias Dr. Usman–Pic from Dawn

The suspected mastermind behind the bloody attack on the Sri Lankan national cricket team in the Pakistani city of Lahore in 2009 was hanged on Friday along with another terrorist suspect, foreign media reported. Aqeel Ahmad alias Dr. Usman was captured at a location in Lahore in October 2009 after he was injured while trying to blow himself up, the reports said.

The other person to be hanged was Arshad Mehmood alias Meharban for his role in the attempted assassination bid on former Pakistan Prime Minister Pervez Musharraf in 2003. The pair was hanged at the Faisalabad Jail at around 9 p.m. and the executions were the first to take place after the Pakistan government ended a moratorium on the death penalty in the wake of a Taliban school massacre that killed 148 students and staff in Peshawar on Tuesday this week.
Dr. Usman, a former soldier of the Army Medical Corps was also involved in the attack on the Pakistan Army Headquarters in Rawalpindi in 2009 and was an active member of the banned organisation, Lashkar-e-Jhangvi. He was also involved in the February 2008 assassination of Pakistani Lt-Gen Mushtaq Ahmed Baig of the Army Medical Corps and in the Islamabad Marriott Hotel bombing in September 2008.

At least nine national cricketers were injured in the bus attack a short distance away from the Lahore Stadium.

***

 Attack in progress–AFP Bloodied mini-van carrying umpires, the driver being killed –AFP

 Corpse of a Pakistani killed in the course of the attack being removed –AFP

Latter-day commemoration of the Pakistani

dead

+++++++++++++++

Another news report about the hanging of Dr Usman

A retired soldier, Imran Siddiq, was awarded life imprisonment in the case at the time whereas three civilians — Khaliqur Rehman, Mohammad Usman and Wajid Mehmood — were given life terms while two others, Mohammad Adnan and Tahir Shafiq (both civilians), were given eight and seven years jail sentence respectively.

Apart from Dr Usman, who was caught during the attack, other serviceman and five civilians were found guilty of abetment.

Their trial by the military court, which was headed by a brigadier, had lasted over five months and had taken place at an undisclosed location.

Mehmood, who was a trooper, was among the five sentenced to be hanged for their role in an Al Qaeda-inspired assassination attempt on Musharraf’s life in late 2003.

Musharraf, who was in power at the time, narrowly escaped the bid when two suicide car bombers rammed his motorcade on Dec 25, 2003, in Rawalpindi. Fifteen people were killed in that attack.

It was the second attempt on Musharraf’s life that month, and several soldiers, air force personnel and militants were arrested after the two attacks.

Mehmood and civilians Zubair Ahmed, Rashid Bhatti, Rashid Qureshi, Ghulam Sarwar and Akhlaque Ahmed were convicted in the case.