Khyber Agency violence: Four children killed in mortar attack

Victims were migrating with family after being asked to vacate the area.

PESHAWAR:

Four children were killed while a woman sustained injuries, when a mortar shell hit their vehicle in the Qamarabad area of Bara Tehsil in Khyber Agency on Friday.

The children and woman, who belonged to the same family, were among the 1,500 families migrating from Bara Tehsil, after a deadline was given by the political administration and Frontier Corps to vacate the area before launching a military operation. The residents were told to move to Peshawar and the Jalozai Camp.

The children, one girl and three boys, were aged between three and nine years, officials said. “Four children were killed and two women were critically wounded. They were from one family,” Bakhtiar Khan, an administrative official in Bara said. Syed Ahmad Jan, another government official, told AFP that “there was an exchange of fire between militants and troops, and subsequently, a stray mortar hit the family’s vehicle. Zahir Shah, the driver of the vehicle, lost two of his sons, niece and nephew, Khan claimed.

Police official targeted

A remote-controlled roadside bomb attack, targeting a police vehicle left a passerby injured and two Edhi ambulances completely destroyed on the GT Road in Chamkani, Peshawar on Friday.

Chamkani Police Station House Officer Haji Inayat told The Express Tribune that the blast occurred when Faqirabad Circle Deputy Superintendent Banaras Khan was passing by in his vehicle. Khan escaped unhurt. However, a passerby sustained minor injuries. Two vehicles of the nearby Edhi center were destroyed in the attack, while the centre was also damaged. A bomb disposal squad inspected the site, and an official of the squad told The Express Tribune that “the bomb was concealed in a manhole and was detonated via remote control.”

ANP worker gunned down

Meanwhile, Dilawar Khan Mohmand, a senior Awami National Party worker, and a pro-government tribal elder was gunned down by unidentified motorcyclists in Mohallah Alfalah, Peshawar, in the jurisdiction of Hashtnagri police station on Friday.

His son Nawabzada told The Express Tribune that Dilawar was on his way home from work, when two men intercepted and shot him. “He died on the spot. He was rushed to the Lady Reading Hospital where he was pronounced dead,” he reiterated, adding that it was a case of targeted killing. Nawabzada stated that Dilawar was constantly receiving threatening letters and telephone calls, and in 2010 he was kidnapped by militants.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 12^th, 2012.