Culprits involved in blast near Musharraf's residence arrested

Islamabad, Oct 11 (UNI) Pakistan's President General Pervez Musharraf disclosed today said that security agencies had arrested the culprits, involved in the last week's blast in Ayub Park and the abortive attempts to fire rockets in the federal capital.

The mysterious blast, which took place in the proximity of President Musharraf's official residence in the garrison town of Rawalpindi, triggered speculations about another abortive attempt on life of President Musharraf, who earlier survived two such attempts in 2003.

The explosion followed discovery of at least four rockets close to the parliament house and the Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) headquarters in next two days, setting off ripples among the people and ringing terror bells for the security agencies. The 107 MM rockets detected with the help of sniffer dogs were later defused by the security agencies.

''The intelligence agencies have arrested extremists involved in the plot,'' the President told media persons here tonight at an Iftar dinner.

Asked whether he was the target, he said in a lighter vein, ''I am not an easy target,'' and added he was not sure whether the rockets found near the President's secretariat were targeted at him or not.

''We have unearthed the whole gang, caught the culprits who are extremists,'' he said.

On extremism and terrorism, he asked moderates to play a proactive role against extremism, saying the government was taking political, administrative and miltary measures to curb the menace.

''The world was currently passing through a critical stage and in acts of violence, killings, terrorism both the perpetrators and the victims were the Muslims,'' he said and added the alarming situation requires that a conciliatory course is adopted with the West to find a solution to the problem.

''I believe in a conciliatory approach on equal terms,'' he said, adding the world also wants to find a way out.

''This is the biggest opportunity that we have to shun extremism and terrorism, as it will not take us anywhere, and to work for the socio-economic uplift of our people.'' UNI XC DH RAI0133