A huge cache of NATO weapons and ammunition was recovered during a raid on an empty house in the Karachi’s Azizabad area.
According to police, this is the biggest ever cache of firearms seized in the history of Karachi.
The seized weapons include 11 anti-aircraft guns, 17 grenade launchers, 39 LMGs, 9 RPG-7, 82 SMGs, 11 7-MM, one M-16, 32 China rifles 7.62, 10 G-3, 5 sniper rifles, 2 repeaters, 9 short SMGs and 245 magazines of SMGs and G-3.
The police also claimed seizing 200 hand grenades, 2000 rifle grenades, 140 bullet-proof jackets and huge quantity of ammunition. Weapons not common in Pakistan are also among the recovered arms.
“This is the biggest recovery of arms and ammunition in the history of Karachi,” Karachi Additional IG Mushtaq Maher said.
“Weapons used by NATO forces and some official Pakistani weapons are also among the recovered arms. We are conducting forensic tests of these weapons to ascertain if they have earlier been used in Karachi,” Maher added.
Maher, citing disclosures made by a detained suspect, said that big-wigs of a political party provided help in procuring these arms and ammunition.
The police had to hire at least three Mazda trucks to shift the huge cache of weapons to the DIG office where AIG Karachi along with the Central DIG and SSP Muqaddas Haider held a press conference.
The city police chief claimed that these arms were supposed to be used by the elements residing in London for terror activities in the metropolis but it was foiled through timely action by security institutions.
“These weapons were hidden for terror acts to be perpetrated by terrorists of a political party based in South Africa,” Maher said.
Interestingly, law enforcement agencies, particularly Rangers, have raided Azizabad a number of times in the past and claimed similar but much lower in scale recoveries.
Earlier in March, a large cache of ammunition was recovered by Rangers during a raid at MQM headquarters, Nine Zero. According to Rangers spokesperson Col. Tahir, the ammunition stolen from NATO containers was also seized during the search operation.
