Lives cut short: Three ANP workers among five slain in Karachi

Four attackers on motorcycles open fire at car; 10-year-old killed.

KARACHI:

Three Awami National Party (ANP) activists were shot dead along with two others, including a 10-year-old boy, by unidentified men in Orangi Town’s MPR Colony on Thursday.

The shooting was carried out by four assailants who were riding on two motorcycles, according to Superintendent Police Orangi Malik Muhammad Ehsan.

Three of the deceased were ANP Sindh activists Dr Israr, Jamshed Khan and Razeemullah and the other two, Iqbal Khan and minor Sajjad, were guests from Swat.

Police said the group was returning from a visit to Manghopir Lake. Just as their vehicle made a stop at a road near the MPR Colony graveyard, the assailants ambushed their car.

The police said that the bodies of the deceased were sprayed with bullets from 9 mm and .30 calibre pistols. The bodies were taken for an autopsy to Abbasi Shaheed Hospital.

Police said that Dr Isar and his friends were receiving threats from militant outfits for extortion, and linked the warnings to the attack.

According to ANP Sindh leader Bashir Jan, the three activists of ANP had allegedly received extortion slips from the Swat chapter of the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan.  The deceased were running a small-scale real estate and property business in the area.

Another ANP Sindh leader Shahi Syed has condemned the attacked in a statement and has called upon the government to hand over Karachi to the army.

“There are no signs of government in the city and the provincial government has failed,” said Syed, adding that the ANP can’t perform its political activities in the city and its activists are being targeted and killed.

Police seize car laden with explosives

The Crime Investigation Department (CID) of Sindh Police seized a van carrying 120 kilogrammes of explosive at Karachi’s Mauripur Road late evening on Thursday and arrested two men suspected of belonging to the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP).

According to CID’s Crime Interrogation Unit in-charge Mazhar Mashwani, the explosives inside the van were ready for use and had been rigged for detonation through a remote control device.

“They [the suspects] planned to use the van to attack SHO Shafiq Tanoli, but they were unable to reach him,” said Mashwani.

The van itself, which belonged to an NGO, had been snatched from its owners on February 9, police officials said.

 

Published in The Express Tribune, February 21^st, 2014.