Malik Ishaq (Urdu: ملک اسحاق ; 1959 – 29 July 2015) was a Pakistanimilitant globally designated terrorist, and leader and co-founder of the Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ) terrorist organization.
Malik was killed, along with his two sons and deputy Ghulam Rasool Shah, in a police encounter on 29 July 2015, the circumstances of which are disputed.[2][3]Punjab Home MinisterShuja Khanzada was assassinated in Attock a month later, in an attack claimed by LeJ as retaliation.[4] Ishaq was described by various news agencies as Pakistan's most feared terror kingpin.[5]
Malik Ishaq was born to a poor family in Rahim Yar Khan District of Punjab, Pakistan. His father was a cloth merchant. Educated until sixth class, Ishaq spent three years working at his father's shop until 1984, when he began working as a cigarette vendor according to police records.[7]
In 1996, Ishaq, along with Riaz Basra and Akram Lahori, co-founded LeJ, a violent splinter group of the original SSP.[8] He confessed his involvement in the killing of 102 Shias to an Urdu newspaper in October 1997, before being rearrested.[9] He assumed senior leadership of LeJ from jail after Basra was killed in a police encounter in 2002.
He was never convicted, owing to weak evidence and intimidation of judges and witnesses.[11]
Release and possible deal
Ishaq was released on bail after 14 years in July 2011,[9] amid speculation of a deal and growing ties with the Pakistan Muslim League (N), the ruling party in Punjab. He was showered with rose petals by supporters, and received by Tahir Ashrafi and SSP president Ahmad Ludhianvi.
The province's Law Minister Rana Sanaullah denied there was any deal behind Ishaq's release, but said extremist leaders were free to join politics if they eschewed violence. Sanaullah said of the occasion, "We are in touch with those who have become, or want to become, useful citizens."[11] Soon after his release, The Associated Press reported Ishaq again making public speeches against the Shia community and threatening his opponents on 4 September 2011, saying "We know how to kill and how to die."[11] Ishaq was appointed Vice-President of Ahle Sunnat Wal Jamaat, the renamed SSP, in 2012.
Ishaq was rearrested after the LeJ claimed responsibility for multiple bombings that killed over 200 Hazara Shias in Quetta in January and February, 2013. Taken together, the bombings were the deadliest attack against any minority in the history of Pakistan.
Death and aftermath
Malik Ishaq was killed in Muzaffargarh, Punjab, in a police encounter with the Counter Terrorism Department of the Punjab Police on the morning of 29 July 2015, along with his two sons, Usman and Haq Nawaz. Also killed among Ishaq's entourage were 11 others, including his deputy and purported LeJ second-in-command Syed Ghulam Rasool Shah, as well as Shah's two sons.[2]
According to the police, Ishaq and his associates were being shifted from Multan to Muzaffargarh to locate an illegal weapons storage site, when a group of armed supporters attacked the police convoy in an attempt to free Ishaq.[3][15] This was disputed by local and international news agencies including The Economist, which stated, "The police have barely bothered to pretend the incident was anything other than a mass extra-judicial killing."[5]
On 16 August 2015, the home office of Punjab Home MinisterShuja Khanzada, located in Shadikhan, Attock, was attacked by two suicide bombers, killing Khanzada and 18 others. Preliminary reports prepared by Pakistani law enforcement agencies suggested Khanzada was attacked in retaliation for the killing of Malik Ishaq.[16] The LeJ claimed responsibility for the attack, confirming it was for Ishaq's killing in July.[4]
