10-08-2025
Pakistani member of intl. terror group caught working at Itaewon shop
Suspect is accused of affiliation with Lashkar-e-Taiba, group responsible for 2008 Mumbai attacks
South Korean police have arrested a Pakistani man working as a market clerk in Seoul's Itaewon district who was found to be a member of Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), the terrorist organization behind the infamous 2008 Mumbai attacks.
Officials at the Gyeonggi Nambu Provincial Police Agency said the suspect in his 40s was arrested in violation of the Act on Counter-Terrorism and the Immigration Act. He was nabbed in Itaewon-dong, Seoul, on Aug. 2, where he had been working at a local market.
Investigators found that the suspect joined LeT in Pakistan in 2020, underwent training in the use of weapons and infiltration tactics and was accepted as an official member of the organization. He entered South Korea in December 2023 using a visa he obtained from a South Korean consulate in Pakistan that September, allegedly by posing as a businessman intending to establish a business in the country.
Although he is not accused of plotting or carrying out any acts of terrorism within South Korea, his membership in LeT violates Article 17 of the Act on Counter-Terrorism for the Protection of Citizens and Public Security, which prohibits involvement with terrorist groups. The suspect reportedly denies the charges.
Police officials are conducting an investigation to determine whether he sent any money to LeT.
This reportedly marks the first time Korean police have arrested a member of a group designated as a terrorist organization by the United Nations Security Council.
LeT was listed as a terrorist group in May 2005 for being associated with Al-Qaida, Osama bin Laden or the Taliban. It supported bin Laden and these groups while financing terrorist activities and providing training, logistical and infrastructural support to further such activities through its front organization, Jamaat-ud-Dawa.
It is responsible for numerous acts of terrorism, including an attack this year in the Pahalgam district of India-administered Kashmir that killed 26 and injured 20, and the 2008 Mumbai attacks that killed 175, including the nine attackers.
