Mass detentions overnight in south-west city of Quetta took the number of suspected militants and Islamist activists arrested nation-wide to over 700 during the past week, police said on Thursday. President Pervez Musharraf ordered the crackdown in the wake of the July 7 London bombings, but the main targets for police have been militant Sunni Muslim groups waging a campaign against minority Shia Muslims, and preachers of sectarian hatred.
Police arrested members of the outlawed Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan in Quetta. "We have rounded up around 114 people from all over the city," said Pervez Zahoor, Quetta's senior superintendent of police.
He said hate material including books and computer CDs were also recovered.
The crackdown began a week after it became known that three Britons of Pakistani descent had carried out the suspected suicide attacks on London that killed 56 people. A fourth bomber was a Briton of Jamaican origin.
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