KARACHI: Pakistani religious extremist Tariq Mahmood went to a mosque one Friday and emerged a changed man. His epiphany was not about helping the poor or leading a more pious life, it was about wielding a gun in the name of God to murder innocent members of the minority Shiite sect of Islam.

Now the policeman turned triple murderer recites the Qur'aan from behind bars. "One speech during Friday prayers changed my life, converted me from a law enforcer to a law breaker," he said with the holy book in his hand. "I have no regrets about what I did." Religious terrorists seem to roam the city spreading death and mayhem almost at will. Some 60 people, Sunnis and Shiites, have been killed in sectarian violence this year in Karachi alone.

"These terrorists do not kill people because of any enmity, but out of their religious duty," said Sindh provincial police chief Aftab Nabi, referring to centuries-old grievances between the Sunni and Shiite Muslims.

Crime Investigation Agency chief Manzoor Mughal said joint teams of police and army officers had conducted interrogations, but the terror suspects usually displayed chilling composure. "All those arrested have the same views and beliefs as Mahmood and remain very cool and composed during the initial interrogation, as they believe they have done nothing wrong," he said.

President Pervez Musharraf last week vowed to crackdown on Pakistan's gun culture and extremist networks following a spate of cold-blooded assassinations of high-profile public figures. Two of the four assassinations involved Shiites - Pakistan State Oil managing director Shaukat Mirza and Defence Ministry research director Syed Zafar Hussain - confirming fears that extremists are waging a new campaign of sectarian cleansing of the government.

"I am extremely conscious of this issue because it is destabilising us psychologically as well as economically," Musharraf said in a tough speech to an arms control seminar on Thursday last. "Enough is enough. We have to work more actively and aggressively in all areas where extremism is causing us harm."

The general and military chief said he wished he could have "personally gone and shot" the killers. "I wish I could have personally gone after those who deprive sons and daughters of their fathers. I wish I could have gone for the assistance of wives whose husbands have been killed. But unfortunately I can't," he said.

"The saddest part is that when I spoke to Mirza's wife to condole the death of her husband she demanded justice. But where are the criminals who committed this crime?" He admitted that despite his earlier promises to clamp down on terrorists, the "law and order situation, under the present government, is no better, no worse than before".

But leading psychiatrist Haroon Ahmed said the root cause of the problem began at religious schools where uneducated young men were "brainwashed" into believing a jihad, or holy war, was being fought on Pakistan's streets.

"This is the natural outcome of our policies of promoting the seminary culture. As a result, boys between the age of 13 and 16 are turning into terrorists as they have been completely brainwashed," he said. Others said the corrupt judiciary was also to blame for allowing itself to be manipulated and intimidated by the fanatics.

"How can you eliminate the terrorists without a powerful judicial system?" asked Karachi Bar Association General Secretary Mahmoodul Hasan. "Several lawyers, who have appeared against a terrorist of one sectarian group or the other, have been killed in the past three years." Underground Sunni radical group Lashkar-e-Jhangvi has claimed responsibility for the assassinations of Mirza and Hussain, who were gunned down as they drove to work.

Police said the group, headed by Afghan-based Pakistani Riaz Basra, has training camps to drill its followers in the finer techniques of terror. "I have interrogated several of their activists including Basra. Most of them admitted they were trained in Afghanistan," one police officer said, refusing to be named.