Five Pakistanis detained in Uganda for militant links

, Jun 26: Ugandan authorities on Sunday detained five Pakistani men for allegedly keeping links with militants, local police said on Tuesday. The incident occurred two weeks prior to the second anniversary of a bomb attack here for which Somali Islamist rebel group al-Shabaab later claimed responsibility.

Uganda has been under threat from the Somalian rebel group which has warned of repeated attack unless the former decides to pull out its troops currently leading an African Union force in Somalia to protect its government. The two countries are separated by Kenya and are 995 miles apart in central-eastern Africa.

The place from where the Pakistanis were held was previously a base of Allied Democratic Forces (ADF-NALU) in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). The ADF-NALU is a dormant Islamist rebel group and said to have links to al-Shabaab.

The Pakistani men were held in the western district of Ntoroko near Rwenzori mountains on the borders with the Democratic Republic of Congo. Local police authorities suspected the gang for they were allegedly entering Uganda illegally. They were also accompanied by a Congolese who did not have proper identification documents, it is learnt. All six of them were taken to Kampala for interrogation.

Al-Shabaab, which has close links with the al-Qaeda, claimed responsibility for the Jul 2010 attacks which killed 79 people while they were watching the football world cup final.

OneIndia News