'Mastermind' of Peshawar suicide case traced; suspect arrested: Pak police

Pakistani security forces have traced the "mastermind" and "handler" of the deadly Peshawar suicide blast at a mosque and arrested a key suspect in the case, police said on Friday.

A powerful explosion ripped through a mosque in Peshawar’s Red Zone area on January 30, where between 300 and 400 people — mostly police officers — had gathered for prayers, killing 84 people.

Addressing a press conference, Additional Inspector General (AIG) of Police Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Shaukat Abbas, said that the Counter Terrorism Department (CTD) detained the suspect, a “backup suicide bomber”, identified as Imtiaz Khan. Khan would have been the second option during the attack if the first bomber had failed to detonate his vest.

The investigation revealed that the planning for the Peshawar suicide bombing was done in Afghanistan.

"The bomber who carried out the attack is known as ‘Qari’ in the TTP circles,” Abbas said.

According to Abbas, a splinter group of the outlawed Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) militant group, Jamaat-ul-Ahrar, was behind the incident.

Law enforcement agencies also identified a “mastermind” and a “handler” associated with the bombers, who was identified as Ghaffar alias Salman.

“We have found that Ghaffar was in contact with the suicide bomber on the day of the incident. We are trying to apprehend the handler and the mastermind of the attack,” Abbas was quoted as saying in the report.

The Pakistani Taliban has a stronghold in Peshawar, the capital of the restive Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.

In November last year, the TTP called off an indefinite ceasefire, agreed with the government in June 2022 and ordered its militants to carry out attacks on the security forces.

The TTP, set up as an umbrella group of several militant outfits in 2007, called off a ceasefire with the federal government and ordered its militants to stage terrorist attacks across the country.

The group, which is believed to be close to Al-Qaeda, has been blamed for several deadly attacks across Pakistan, including an attack on army headquarters in 2009, assaults on military bases, and the 2008 bombing of the Marriott Hotel in Islamabad.

In 2014, the Pakistani Taliban stormed the Army Public School in the northwestern city of Peshawar, killing at least 150 people, including 131 students.