Unabated violence: FC convoy targeted with bomb in Kurram

Blast kills four paramilitary soldiers; another bomb attack leaves two policemen dead in Mansehra


Our Correspondent February 04, 2015
Security officials gather near the police van after it came under attack in Mansehra. PHOTO: ONLINE

MANSEHRA/ PARACHINAR/ BANNU:


Four paramilitary troops and two police officials were killed in separate bomb attacks in northern Pakistan on Tuesday. The outlawed Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) claimed responsibility for the attacks in Kurram Agency and Mansehra district of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa.


Four Frontier Corps troops were killed when a paramilitary convoy was targeted with a roadside bomb. The convoy was en route to Parachinar, the administrative headquarters of Kurram Agency, from the Oramgee area. One of the vehicles in the convoy hit an improvised explosive device (IED) planted by the roadside, according to security officials.

The vehicle was destroyed in the attack, killing four people onboard, the officials said. The bodies were shifted to Parachinar, from where they were dispatched to the hometowns for their burial.

The officials said the security forces launched a retaliatory operation. Two militants, including a key commander, were killed and three others arrested, the officials claimed but didn’t identify the arrested militants who were subsequently shifted to an undisclosed location for interrogation. There was no independent confirmation of the claim, though.

The area where the attack took place borders the militant-infested Tirah Valley of Khyber Agency where a security operation has been ongoing since mid-October.

Meanwhile suspected extremists remotely triggered a bomb near a police van on the outskirts of Mansehra late Monday night, killing two police officials and wounding as many.

“The remote-controlled device was detonated minutes after a convoy of passenger buses left for Gilgit,” DPO Ejaz Khan told The Express Tribune. He said a van of the City police station was returning after escorting the convoy of Gilgit-bound buses when the bomb planted under a garbage heap on Karakoram Highway near Lari Adda was triggered.

SI Fareed Khan was killed and constables Ajmal, Bilal and Rizwan were wounded in the attack.  The casualties were removed to the King Abdullah Teaching Hospital where constable Ajmal succumbed to injuries. DPO Khan said the explosive device weighed half a kilo.

Upon hearing the news of the bomb attack, the mother of injured constable Rizwan died of cardiac arrest, family sources in his native village Gali Bagh told the media.

TTP spokesperson Muhammad Kharasani, claimed responsibility for both attacks in a statement. The group frequently attacks police and security forces in a bid to undermine security.

Though Hazara region of K-P has been largely unaffected by Taliban militancy, it wasn’t the first of its kind attack on law enforcers. On December 24, 2013 a police constable was killed, while five others were injured in twin attacks in twin bomb blasts on Mansehra’s Jail Road. Similarly, two policemen were killed in a terrorist attack on a police van in Torghar district, near Mansehra, on June 20, 2014.

In other violence a vehicle carrying participants of a grand tribal Jirga was attacked with a roadside bomb in FR Bannu, but luckily no casualties were reported. Elders and tribesmen from three sub-clans of the Janikhel tribe participated in the Jirga organised by the Stori Welfare Society in the Mamtankhel area.

The Jirga participants stressed the need for unity in the Janikhel sub-clans in order to bring peace and prosperity in the region. They said that in the prevailing volatile situation, the future of their future generation was at stake. They decided to play their role for brokering peace negotiations between the government and the local militants.

After the Jirga, one of the tribal elders, Moaiz Khan, was travelling back home when his vehicle was targeted with an IED in the Lalah Kala Algada area. However, all those on board the vehicle, including Khan, remained unhurt, though the vehicle was damaged in the attack.


Published in The Express Tribune, February 4th, 2015.

COMMENTS

Replying to X

Comments are moderated and generally will be posted if they are on-topic and not abusive.

For more information, please see our Comments FAQ