A Pakistani national from the troubled northwest was arrested at the Karachi airport trying to board an aircraft for the Gulf after police found electric circuits and batteries hidden in his shoes.
The arrested man identified as Faiz Muhammad who was travelling to Muscat by Thai airways was arrested yesterday at the airport when scanners sounded an alarm, police said.
They said the 30-year-old civil engineer is being interrogated by the police to find whether he had any links with terror outfits. The bearded man was not found to be carrying any explosives but officials were worried as the batteries and electric circuit in his shoes was potent enough to set off an explosion in an aircraft.
The man told the police he was using shoes with electric system to give him foot massage while working or travelling. Police has sent the shoes for verification as the man was detained for interrogation.
Karachi airport continues to be on high alert following a recent spate of suicide attacks and bombings in different parts of the country.
"He had sophisticated electronic circuits hidden in his shoes which could be used to create and detonate explosive material," an official said.
He said the man who originally belonged to Manshera in North West Frontier province was said to be a civil engineer by qualification and was presently being interrogated by ASF and intelligence officials. Richard Reid, a British man, tried to blow up a transatlantic jet in December 2001 with explosives hidden in his shoes.
The Karachi detention comes a week after US agents arrested a Pakistani-American man Faisal Shahzad, for allegedly attempting to blow up a car bomb in New York.