Mufti Waqas was said to be the mastermind behind the attack on the army camp in Sunjwan last month
Terror group Jaish-e-Mohammed's chief commander Mufti Waqas, believed to be the mastermind of the last month's
suicide attack on Sunjwan Army Camp, has been killed in an intelligence-driven operation, the army and the police announced today. He had been killed in an encounter at Hatiwara area of Awantipora, South Kashmir.
The army called the elimination of the top Jaish commander a "major dent" in capability of the Jaish-e-Mohammed.
Mufti Waqas' killing is seen as a major success for the security establishment, particularly because it comes just months after the elimination of Jaish's earlier operational commander
Noor Mohd Tantrey on 17 December a short distance from the location of today's security operation.
Five soldiers and a civilian were killed and 10 people injured in the February 10 attack on the Sunjuwan army camp, counted as one of the worst since the 2016 Uri attack, in which 19 soldiers were killed. The four Jaish-e-Mohammed terrorists who carried out the suicide attack at the army camp in the heart of Jammu were also killed.
He was not only the mastermind of suicide attacks on Sunjwan army camp in the heart of Jammu but had also orchestrated the attacks on the district police lines in Lethpora in Pulwama district and the
Border Security Force camp at the Srinagar airport, Jammu and Kashmir's top police officer SP Vaid said.
Among the three terrorists killed in the Lethpora attack on 31 December was a 16-year-old, son of a policeman who had joined the Jaish just a few months earlier. Five Central Reserve Police Force personnel were killed in this gun-battle.
Mufti Waqas is also accused of planning the attack on the BSF camp at the Srinagar airport in October last year by three terrorists, carrying a massive arsenal of guns and explosives. One soldier was died in this attack.