Islamabad, March 05: The Geo news channel – a Pakistani TV – has aired what it claims is footage of the terrorists escaping the site of Tuesday’s dastardly attack on the Sri Lankan cricket players in Lahore. The dramatic visuals show the gunmen fleeing on motorcycles and on foot.
The edited footage of Geo TV were captured on CCTV cameras in the streets around Liberty chowk and Gaddafi stadium where a group of gunmen, said to number 14 killed six policemen and injured five members of Sri Lankan cricket team.
“The exclusive footage reveals that attackers carried out the heinous act with full impunity. They started firing indiscriminately at the cricketers’ bus at 8.39 a.m. on March 3” Geo TV said on its website adding, “The gunmen managed to flee from the spot at 8.46 a.m,”.
The grainy visual of Geo network shows a man arriving on motorbike in what appears to be a side lane. Two other men walk hastily towards him before all the three drive away.
The footage then cuts to show three men, at least two of them apparently carrying guns walking down the same lane with one of them entering into a street-side building.
The footage again cuts to another area that shows motorbikes driving in a street while two of them driving in the opposite directions.
The visuals nail the lie of police who claim that they had cordoned off the area immediately after the attack began at 8:30 a.m.
Chris Broad – a British ICC match referee – caught up in the attack has criticised Pakistani securities for failing to protect them. “We were promised high-level security and in our hour of need that security vanished” said Chris.
Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari has vowed that the attackers will be caught, and punished “with iron hands”. At least 60 people have been arrested four men from Lahore’s Model Town area for their alleged involvement in the strike.
–IANS