Suspected facilitator of Sehwan blast spotted in CCTV footage

A suspected facilitator of the suicide attack at Lal Shahbaz Qalandar's shrine in Sehwan has been spotted bypassing a security check in a video released by the Sindh police on Sunday.

Dawn quoted Inspector General Police of Sindh A.D. Khawaja as saying that the facilitator shown in the CCTV is Hafeez Brohi, who is suspected of being involved in the Shikarpur and Jacobabad blasts.

He added that a man was arrested by the police in connection with the Sehwan blast in Johi and was sent to an undisclosed location for further investigation.

The death toll in the deadly Lal Shahbaz Qalandar attack has risen to 88 since Friday night.

The official list of casualties show that 76 bodies were received and handled at the Shah Abdullah Institute of Medical Sciences, four at the People's Medical University (PMH) Hospital in Shaheed Benazirabad, and eight at Chandka Medical University Hospital in Larkana.

Meanwhile, the Sindh government will have the case investigated through Sindh police's Counterterrorism Department (CTD), similar to the suicide bombings in Jacobabad during Ashura and at Shikarpur's shrine, and then again last year in Shikarpur on the second day of Eidul Azha.

Officials believe there might be some handler or facilitator of the suicide bomber who must have provided logistical support.

Sehwan police had lodged a case on Friday against one suicide bomber and three facilitators involved in the Feb 16 suicide bombing at the shrine of Lal Shahbaz Qalandar.

The shrine has now been opened for the general public. Police had also completed the geo-fencing part of the investigation, which entails police and security agencies obtaining data of all calls, incoming and outgoing, that have touched the towers of different cell phone companies in a given area.