Senior Lashkar-e-Jhangvi militant killed in raid

Intelligence officer killed, four soldiers wounded in operation targeting Badeni

Pakistan’s military has killed a senior member of Islamist militant group Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ) along with two suicide bombers in a raid in the southwestern province of Balochistan, the army’s media wing said yesterday.

A military intelligence officer was killed and four other soldiers wounded during the operation targeting Salman Badeni, the Balochistan region chief of LeJ, on the outskirts of provincial capital Quetta.

Badeni had been “involved in killings of over 100 innocent personnel of Hazara Community and police”, the army said in a statement.

The military also released pictures of a blood-spattered militant laying dead on the ground, along with photos of ammunition and what appears to be bomb-making material.

LeJ, a group which subscribes to the hardline Takfiri Deobandi school of Islam, considers Shi’ites apostates and has carried out scores of bloody bomb and gun attacks in Balochistan over the past two decades, most of them aimed at the Hazara community.

Earlier this month members of the Hazara community went on a hunger strike in Quetta to protest a recent spate of killings targeting them and to demand greater protection in the resourcerich province that has been plagued by violence and insurgency. In recent years Daesh militants have also targeted the Hazara community in Balochistan.