Policeman killed in Hangu rocket attack

Local Taliban claim responsibility for the attack on a police patrol van.

PESHAWAR: A policeman was killed and seven others were wounded on Monday after militants fired rockets at a police patrol van in Balyamina village, about 10 kilometres from Hangu, on Monday, officials said.

The condition of one of the injured is said to be critical. Local Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack.

“One policeman was killed and seven others wounded, one of them critically after militants fired five rockets and shot at their van patrolling the village,” police spokesman Fazal Naeem told AFP.

A senior police official, Abdul Rasheed, confirmed the incident.

Taliban spokesman Azam Tariq said: “Our attacks will continue until (US) drone attacks and operations in tribal areas, which are killing innocent people, are stopped.”

A covert US missile campaign in the tribal areas has escalated in recent months with Islamabad’s tacit agreement, despite public protestations.

Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa and tribal areas have been struck by violence since hundreds of Taliban and al Qaeda fighters sought refuge there after the US-led invasion of Afghanistan in 2001.

The government has claimed a number of military successes against the hardliners over the past two years, but attacks continue across the country and are concentrated in the northwest.

Pakistan launched its most ambitious military offensive yet against Taliban militants in South Waziristan in 2009.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 8^th, 2011.