Pakistan has accused Indian agencies of killing Lashkar terrorists killed in various Pakistani cities in recent days, but India has vehemently rejected all the allegations.
While the round of allegations and counter-allegations was going on between the two countries, Lashkar’s intelligence chief Azam Cheema died in Faisalabad, Pakistan.
His age was about 70 years. After this, speculations have again intensified in the Jihadi circles of Pakistan.
Cheema was one of the main conspirators of the 26/11 terrorist attacks and the July 2006 Mumbai train bombings, as well as several other terrorist attacks in India.
As soon as the news of Cheema’s death came out, the claims of Indian agencies got strengthened that many terrorists are present in Pakistan. However, Islamabad continues to deny.
According to intelligence sources, Cheema spoke Punjabi. He was a Lashkar-e-Taiba terrorist. She spent her life in Bahawalpur, Pakistan in the early 2000s. He lived there with his wife and two children.
A source said, “He was often seen moving around in a Land Cruiser accompanied by six bodyguards. It was Cheema who once brought former ISI chief General Hamid Gul, Brigadier Riaz and Colonel Rafiq to brainwash the jihadis undergoing arms training at the Bahawalpur camp. He used to go to Karachi sometimes and also visited the Lahore training camp.”
Cheema had experience of the Afghan war. He was an expert in reading maps, especially the map of India. Another source said, “He taught the jihadists to locate important installations of India on the map. He also used to give instructions to LeT terrorists across India through satellite phones in the mid-2000s.”
Cheema was working as a LeT commander for Bahawalpur in Pakistan in 2008. During this time, he was appointed as the operational advisor to senior Lashkar officer Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi.
The US Treasury Department describes him as a key commander in Lashkar-e-Taiba operations. He was linked to Osama bin Laden’s al-Qaeda network.