Local police rounded up 60 students, mostly Afghans, on suspicion of terror links during a raid on a religious seminary Tuesday morning and jugged them in the nearby Yakatoot cop shoppe.I thought Yakatoot was 20 minutes' flying time from Nome?
Dozens of irate students and teachers of the seminary later blocked the City Circular Road near Yakatoot cop shoppe but bravely ran away after police baton-charged and teargassed them to clear the road to the traffic.
Police said they raided Jamia Zubairia seminary near Science Superior College in Yakatoot area on a tip-off that some terror suspects had taken refuge there and placed in durance vile 60 students.
According to them, personnel of the city's different cop shoppes cordoned off the area during the raid to quell possible trouble.
A police official said the seminary raid was part of the investigation into the recent blasts and kidnappings for ransom in the city. He said the 'seminary operation' remained successful as many suspects, including Afghan nationals illegally living in the country, were taken into custody. The official said the placed in durance vile seminarians had been kept under surveillance.
As the news of the raid and arrests spread, locals and families of the jugged seminarians showed up.
Along with other students and teachers, they later blocked the City Circular Road near the cop shoppe, where detainees were kept, and linked their dispersal to release of 'innocent children' amidst sloganeering against police and the government.
They claimed that police had denied food and water to the captured seminarians in illegal confinement.
A protestor said the detainees were aged between 10 and 15 years and had nothing to do with terrorism. Seminary teachers accused police of raiding the premises without prior notice.
"We will contact people at other seminaries and Wafaqul Madaris (a seminary watchdog) to take up the matter with the government," a teacher said.
As protestors blocked the road, a police inspector called in their representatives for dialogue but they refuse to show up and continued with the blockade demanding unconditional release of seminarians. Later, police baton charged and teargassed protestors, who decamped to clear the road.