Police have arrested the mastermind behind the June 27 terrorist attack on a Rangers transport office in Karachi’s Gulistan-e-Johar area, along with smugglers who supplied weapons used in the assault, Counter Terrorism Department (CTD) SSP Irfan Bahadur said on Tuesday.

Addressing a joint press conference at the Central Police Office alongside Sindh Home Minister Ziaul Hassan Lanjar, Inspector General of Police, and senior CTD officials, Bahadur said investigators had uncovered a nexus between the India-backed Fitna al-Khawarij and the banned Jamaat-ul-Ahrar, and that Afghan soil had once again been used to plan terrorism inside Pakistan.

Three Sindh Rangers personnel were martyred and four others injured in the attack, according to the Inter-Services Public Relations. Three attackers were killed, and one was arrested in an injured condition.

Bahadur said the attack was carried out in four stages: planning in Afghanistan, transporting the attackers into Pakistan, providing them with full logistical facilitation, and finally supplying them with weapons and hand grenades.

He said the network’s mastermind and key facilitator, identified as Qari Bashir, had also been arrested.

Qari Bashir had seen off the attackers before the assault and had filmed a video of them departing, CTD officials said.

Confessional statement videos of the injured, arrested attacker Usman and of Qari Bashir were played during the press conference.

According to CTD officials, the attackers were selected in Afghanistan, after which lethal weapons were smuggled into Karachi with the help of elements involved in arms trafficking.

Officials said there was irrefutable evidence that safe havens for terrorists exist in Afghanistan.

IGP Sindh said effective operations by law enforcement agencies had led to a marked decline in incidents of terrorism this year compared to last, adding that more than 700 intelligence-based operations had been conducted with significant results.