KARACHI, Oct 17: Police claimed on Wednesday to have arrested the Sindh chief of the banned militant outfit, Lashkar-i-Jhangvi, said to be involved in around 100 targeted killings on sectarian grounds in the city.

Sindh LJ chief Hafiz Qasim Rasheed, who has a Rs500,000 bounty and is listed in the CID Red Book, was arrested following a shoot-out with a team of crime investigation department officials in the football ground of Patel Para, said Additional IG (CID) Ghulam Shabbir Shaikh while speaking at a press conference at the CID Civil Lines offices.

The police claimed to have seized an AK-47 rifle, a TT pistol and a hand grenade found in the possession of Hafiz Rasheed.

Twice arrested in recent years, he was released as many times by courts for want of evidence.

“Courts need testimony of witnesses and people are not forthcoming in the given circumstances,” said the police officer, arguing that there could have been a drastic decline in the killings if such elements had been hanged at public places.

Since 2007, he said, no convict had been executed, which had resulted in a sharp rise in crimes. Yet the officer expressed the hope that there would be a considerable decline in the number of sectarian killings in the city following the latest arrest.

Hafiz Rasheed was associated with the Attaur Rahman alias Naeem Bukhari group, the officer said.

Hit listHaving a network of 35 men in the city, he was supposed to kill some media persons and CID officials whose names were mentioned in a hit list found in his possession, the officer said.

He added security had been provided to the people whose names had been found in the list.

Some of the recent killings Hafiz Rasheed is said to have carried out include that of the two jail officials who were targeted near Nipa and a lawyer gunned down on Jahangir Road a couple of days ago.

The Additional IG quoted Hafiz Rasheed as telling police interrogators that he had killed the jail officials because they used to hurl abuses at and misbehaved with the families of jailed activists of the Lashkar-i-Jhangvi and other militant groups.

The suspected militant was also involved in the killings of Muttahida Qaumi Movement minister Raza Haider, Gulbahar joint sector in charge Adil Jafri, MQM workers Nehal, Noorul Huda, Imran, Yawar Abbas, Barkat Ali, college principal Imran Zaidi,Syed Mehdi Raza, Abbas Haider Rizvi, Zakir Hussain, Abbas Haider, Shahzad, Naseer Hussain and others, the police said.