The police in Amritsar has arrested five men, including a French national, in possession of a large number of weapons, including armour-piercing ammunition and Kalashnikov rifles.
Officials of the Punjab police Special Operations Group responsible for the arrests claimed French resident Pal Singh, Kulwant Singh, Gurmukh Singh, Jagtar Singh and Darshan Singh were all key associates of Babbar Khalsa International and were trained in improvising expl-osives and using deadly weapons.The police said the Amritsar arrests could prove significant in view of recent intelligence reports on regrouped Khalistani terror outfits planning to target the Commonwealth Games.
Two AK-47 rifles, five loaded magazines and 420 live cartridges, including 200 armour-piercing roun-ds, have allegedly been recovered from their possession. But one of the arrested men’s (Pal Singh’s) Canada-based daughter said her father has been in illegal police detention since July 22. Ms Harminder Kaur claimed Pal Singh was a religious preacher who also spearheaded an international campaign against the ban on turbans imposed by the French government some years ago. “My father, who is in his 50s, a heart patient and recovering from eye surgeries, was picked up from our family village Dhandowal, in Jalandhar district, on July 22,” she said. n More on Page 5