Recovery of ammunition from Azizabad: plea approved to close case, police admits failure

An Anti-Terrorism Court (ATC) of Karachi on Tuesday approved plea to close case of recovery of arms from Azizabad area of Karachi. In a report presented to administrative judge of the ATC, Sindh Police admitted their failure in catching criminals who stored a huge cache of weapons in an abandoned house in Azizabad area that was seized by a law enforcement agency in October.
Investigation Officer (IO) of police pleaded to make the case, of recovery of ammunition from Azizabad, A class. The weapons recovered from an underground water tank of a house of Azizabad on October 05 have been the biggest cache among other recoveries so far since inception of the Karachi operation.
The arms and munitions were transferred to the army's ordnance depot for forensic analysis of the weapons to know whether they were used in the incidents of crimes and terrorist attacks, official sources said. The weapons were transported in two police trucks and five mobile vans from DIG West office to the army's ordnance depot. Sindh Police sought help of the army for the weapons analysis due to lack of modern facilities in the police department, sources said. Cache of weapons found included 11 anti-aircraft guns, 39 MMGs, 82 SMGs, around 200 grenades, 2000 rifle grenades and at least 140 bullet proof vests.
The police experts could not analyse the sub-machine guns (SMGs), rocket launchers, Bazooka, G-3 rifles, LMGs and anti-aircraft guns, sources further said. The law enforcement officials had conducted raid at a house in Block-8 of Azizabad near Nine Zero headquarter of Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM), and captured a large consignment of weapons hidden in an underground water tank of a house. No arrests were made during the police raid.