Pakistan arrests alleged al-Qaeda members in plot to kill Musharraf

Dec 13, 2007, 8:51 GMT

Islamabad - Pakistan's intelligence agencies have foiled a plot to assassinate President Pervez Musharraf in the southern port city of Karachi and arrested several al-Qaeda members, officials said Thursday.

'The arrests were made quite recently in a joint operation by various law enforcement agencies in the Malir area of the city,' Major Asad Ali, a spokesman for the country's Rangers paramilitary force, said.

He said the militants were planning to blow up a bridge on which Musharraf's motorcade was to travel on its way from the airport into the city. But he refused to say when the alleged assassination attempt was supposed to take place or how many people were arrested in connection with the plot.

'The arrests are a great success,' Ali said. 'We will provide further information to the media once investigations are completed.'

Musharraf has survived at least three assassinations attempts by al-Qaeda and pro-Taliban militants since 2001, after he dropped support for the Taliban in Afghanistan and allied Pakistan with the United States following the September 11 terrorist attacks.

On December 14, 2003, al-Qaeda-linked militants detonated a bomb under Musharraf's motorcade as it reached a bridge near his official residence in the garrison city of Rawalpindi. But hi-tech jamming devices installed in his limousine delayed the explosion by seven seconds, allowing the convoy to cross the bridge before it collapsed.

Only eleven days later, two suicide bombers rammed explosives-laden cars into Musharraf's motorcade just meters away from the site of previous attacks, killing some 16 people, including several policemen. The president's limousine was heavily damaged but he escaped unharmed.

In July, Musharraf again narrowly escaped an assassination attempt when suspected Islamic militants fired an anti-aircraft gun at his airplane as it took off from Chaklala airbase in Rawalpindi.