Team News Riveting
New Delhi, May 7
The Operation Sindoor conducted by Indian Defence Forces in Pakistan-based terrorist camps had killed 10 family members of Maulana Masood Azhar.
The UN-designated terrorist, Azhar was believed to be hiding in a “safe place” in Bahawalpur. The operation in revenge of Pahalgam terror attack on innocent tourists hit the Subhan Allah Mosque in Bahawalpur, Pakistan that is reportedly the headquarters of Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM). Azhar heads the terror outfit.
News agencies quoting the statement issued the militant group said the deceased included his elder sister and her husband, his nephew and his wife, a niece, and five children from his family. The group also said that the strike killed three of Azhar’s close aides and the mother of one of them.
JeM carried out a suicide bombing in February 2019 that killed 40 troops in Indian-administered Kashmir, bringing the neighbours to the brink of war. Bahawalpur became the hub of the JeM after the release of Azhar in exchange for the hijacked passengers of IC-814 in 1999.
In May 2019, the United Nations designated Azhar a “global terrorist” after China lifted its hold on a proposal to blacklist the JeM chief, a decade after New Delhi approached the world body for the first time on the issue.
The group has been involved in a series of terror attacks in India, including the Parliament attack in 2001, the strike on the Jammu and Kashmir assembly in 2000, the attack on the IAF base in Pathankot in 2016 and the Pulwama suicide bombing in 2019.
