Intelligence officials Thursday claimed arresting two associates of most wanted Uzbek militant Tohir Yoldosh in northern Sar-e-Pol Province., Afghan independent Pajhwok reported

An official of the Intelligence Department named the recently detained activists of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) as Qari Abdol Qader and Qari Hekmatollah.

He told Pajhwok Afghan News that the detainees, who had direct telephone contact with Yoldosh’s representative, were being quizzed by intelligence officials.

According to the source, both men had confessed to receiving instructions from IMU militants with regard to disruptive activities inside Afghanistan.

The two allegedly received orders from Mullah Hafiz, a representative of Yoldosh, and Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) to carry out terrorist acts in northern Afghanistan.

Respectively hailing from Zab and Balchiragh Districts of Fariab province, Qari Abdol Qader and Qari Hekmatollah have reportedly admitted to involvement in creating insecurity in their areas.

Linked to bombings, killing a headmaster and conducting attacks on police personnel in Sar-e-Pol, they are said to have received training in terror techniques at Harira seminary in Quetta, capital of Pakistan’s Baluchistan province.

Ten Kalashnikov assault rifles, 15 landmines, explosives and sensitive documents were sized from the terrorists, the official said.

With close links to al-Qa’idah, IMU chief Tohir Yoldosh has been active in the rugged autonomous tribal areas of Pakistan near the border with Afghanistan after the toppling of the Taleban regime in 2001.

In the wake of a string of military operations in the tribal region and an amnesty for local fighters, support for Uzbek militants among Waziristan tribesmen has considerably declined.