Crime scene: Navy officer gunned down while waiting for his wife

Ghulam Akbar was shot in the neck by unidentified assailants.

KARACHI:

Ghulam Akbar, an officer in the Pakistan Navy, had taken a two-hour break to take his wife to the doctor on Monday. She had been complaining about pain in her ear.

The couple had decided to meet at a bus stop near Karsaz and go to PNS Rahat together. The officer, who was deputed at PNS Aslat, was waiting for his wife at their designated meeting point when unidentified assailants gunned him down within the limits of the Sharae Faisal police station.

"He was waiting for his wife at a bus stop when men on a motorcycle shot and killed him," said Shah Faisal SP Ali Asif while talking to The Express Tribune. "He was shot once in the neck and was taken to a hospital for treatment immediately but succumbed to injuries on the way."

So far the police have been unable to ascertain the motive behind the incident. According to SP, Asif it was too early to say anything.

The police, however, are sure that a 9mm pistol was used as they found the weapon with a motorcycle at the scene of crime. Since there were no CCTV cameras installed at that stretch of the road, the police have no CCTV footage to use in the investigation.

The naval forces said that they were also trying to find out what happened and why. "Our officials, soldiers and sailors are being targeted on the streets of Karachi by bomb blasts and firing but no one is here to stop these incidents or arrest the culprits," said a Pakistan Navy official. "This is the time to take stern action to protect our lives. We need to take action against the militants because if we don't do it now, our morale will go down."

Previous attacks on the Navy

On April 30, a naval officer identified as Fayyaz Ali was shot dead while on duty at PNS Nasar on Korangi Road within the limits of the Defence police station.

A few months before that on February 23, a retired chief petty officer of the Navy, Ali Yar Khan, was gunned down.

Last year in September, a senior official of the Navy, Captain Nadeem Ahmed, 45, and a PhD in Ship Construction Engineering was killed. The captain was also an instructor at the Naval Engineering College, Karachi, and was on his way to PNS Jauhar with his wife when two motorcyclists opened fire at them near Karsaz.

On May 1, 2013, a naval official, Zahid Iqbal, was shot dead in Kharadar. While on February 27 of the same year, a lieutenant commander of the Pakistan Navy, Syed Azeem Haider Kazmi, was seriously injured in a targeted attack near the city port. The same year another naval officer, accompanied by his wife, was injured when a device planted in their car exploded. In September 2011, Lt. Commander Nasir Nafees was shot dead.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 13^th, 2014.