Lal Masjid deputy cleric Abdul Rashid Ghazi and scores of his comrades in battle were killed in a pre-dawn military offensive on the compound they were holed up since early last week. Eight soldiers have died in the fiercest gun battles with the militants, a military spokesperson said.
Major General Arshad Waheed has confirmed 29 troops were wounded. Officials said many of them received bullet injuries and were in critical condition. Some unconfirmed reports put the death toll as high as 200. Information attributed to a local charity suggested 400 have been killed. "We were asked by army to prepare 400 burial dresses," Maulana Abdul Sattar Edhi said.
Arshad told a news conference that troops had rescued 86 men and women from the complex. They included the wife of detained cleric Maulana Abdul Aziz. Ume Hassan was the principal of a female religious school affiliated with the Lal Masjid.
A huge compound in the heart of Islamabad which houses Lal Masjid and a female seminary, Jamia Hafsa, was besieged by paramilitary troops since last Tuesday to punish a Taliban-styled movement being anchored by two clerics. One of them was arrested last week.
Several rounds of negotiations were held with the other one to surrender with some wanted foreigner militants, who were allegedly present inside and free women and children they had taken hostage. But no peace deal could have struck.
Waheed neither did confirm nor deny the presence of al Qaeda linked foreigner operatives inside the mosque compound. "I can't confirm their identities at the moment," he said. "But we had reports they were there."
Abdul Rashid Ghazi, however, dismissed these reports in his last telephonic conversation with some television networks hours before his death. His aged and ailing mother has also reportedly expired due to suffocation.
"The government is using full force. This is naked aggression," was his last message to television channels at around 10.am. "My martyrdom is certain now." Troops acted swiftly after an overnight attempt by top politicians and religious scholars to negotiate a peace deal broke down.
Loud explosions were heard and guns started showering bullets moments after Pakistan Muslim League President Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain announced that talks had failed.
"I have never been as disappointed as I am today. Negotiations have failed," Hussain who spearheaded talks with recalcitrant, Ghazi told a brief news conference on early Tuesday morning. "Forces had moved into the mosque and a full scale assault is under way...it will now end when the whole compound is cleared from miscreants," Waheed Arshad announced at a separate news conference about an hour later. A cloud of thick white smoke that later turned black was seen immediately in the air over the compound.
Officials said the smoke was the camouflage troops used to get into the compound. Forces faced stiff resistance from the militants, who according to army spokesman used rocket launchers, light machine guns, hand grenades and patrol bombs.
However, Ghazi in his last interview insisted that they were "resisting with only 14 Kalashnikovs and have nothing else,". A lull prevailed for a long period after around two hours of intense fighting. All military and private ambulances rushed to the scene and then to the hospitals in Islamabad and Rawalpindi.
This was the moment when security forces pushed the media away from hospitals, fuelling speculations that causalities were high and the government wanted to hide them.
Some media persons were allegedly threatened they would be shot at if seen around the hospitals, a charge later denied by the authorities. A tight cordon around the fortified area was intact till this report is filed amid continuing fire exchange between security forces and militants.
Ambulances were seen moving into the Jamia Hafsa complex and electricity was being restored, signalling a possible end of the operation. Waheed Arshad said troops had cleared most of the compound and the operation was still under way. Officials said an extensive search operation in adjacent sectors would also be carried out on Wednesday.