ISLAMABAD, July 29 (UPI) — Malik Ishaq, leader of the Lashkar-e-Jhangvi Sunni militant group in Pakistan, was killed during a gun battle as his supporters attempted to free him from police custody.
Ishaq, his two sons and three other members of the group, who were captured on Saturday, were being transported to the outskirts of the Muzaffargarh city in the Punjab province where they claimed “they had hidden a cache of arms and ammo,” according to Pakistani police.
When police arrived with the militants to seize the weaponry Tuesday, as many as 12 gunmen began attacking police in an attempt to free the prisoners. Ishaq, his two sons and 11 others were killed in the shootout, according to officials.
Six police officers were wounded and some gunmen escaped. Ishaq was imprisoned from 1997 to 2011, charged in more than 60 criminal cases but was never successfully prosecuted. Some Pakistanis are skeptical of the official account of Ishaq’s death, as security forces in Pakistan, particularly in the Punjab province, are accused of extrajudicial killings of militants.
“Malik Ishaq’s killing in a suspect police encounter shows that the state itself does not seem to have faith in its own legal and justice system,” Omar R. Quraishi, an editor at the ARY news network, told The New York Times.
Lashkar-e-Jhangvi was banned in Pakistan in 2001 for claims of having killed hundreds of civilians, mainly Shiites, in Pakistan. The group took responsibility for two bombings in Quetta in 2013 that killed nearly 200 people.
Ishaq was designated as a “Specially Designated Global Terrorist” by the U.S. Department of State in 2014.
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