LAHORE – Shahbaz Taseer, son of slain Punjab governor Salman Taseer, has slammed the media reports claiming his captor was killed in an encounter with security agencies in Sheikhupura.
Earlier, reports suggested that an alleged kidnapper of Taseer and five other suspected militants were killed in an encounter with a team of the Counter Terrorism Department near Sheikhupura late on Saturday night.
Taseer took to Twitter to respond to the ‘false’ media reports:
Not true at all they are very credible but this story is false. https://t.co/CrmDY0QkvY
— Shahbaz Taseer (@ShahbazTaseer) October 17, 2016
A CTD spokesperson yesterday told the media that they had received intel on the whereabouts of around 10 members of the banned Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), who were present in Sheikhupura, planning an attack on the offices of law enforcement agencies.
On Saturday, at around 12:30am, the CTD team raided a house near the Sheikhupura bypass. “Noticing their presence, the terrorists…tried to flee by a car and two motorcycles.”
The CTD team intercepted and exchanged fire with the group which resulted in six militant casualties. “When the shootout ended, six of the terrorists were dead and the rest had fled,” the spokesperson said.
A senior police official on the condition of anonymity informed that the CTD team had identified one of the deceased as Haji Muhammad alias Pathan, who was accused of being involved in the abduction of Shahbaz Taseer.
“Pathan belonged to two banned organisations – TTP and the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan,” he added.
Shahbaz Taseer was recovered on March 8, nearly five years after his abduction on August 26, 2011 from Lahore.
