Khyber air raids: Gunships target militant hideouts; five killed

Airstrikes targeted militants involved in Saturday’s bomb attacks on polio team escorts.

BARA: Helicopter gunships on Sunday bombed hideouts of suspected militants in Bara Tehsil in Khyber Agency, killing five militants and injuring six others.

A security official said that helicopter gunships targeted the militants who were allegedly involved in Saturday’s IEDs attacks on Khasadar and Levies officials escorting polio vaccinators in Jamrud Tehsil of Khyber. Thirteen people, including security personnel and civilians, were killed in those attacks.

The official said the air raids were carried out in the Shalobar and Mandikas areas of Bara. “Helicopter gunships shelled Ayubi Markaz of militants in the Mandikas area in which five militants were killed and three others were injured,” he added.

In a separate incident, a mortar shell fired from an unknown location slammed into the house of a tribesman, identified as Lal Afzal, near Mandikas areas. As a result three of his daughters – Saeeda, Abida and Salma – were injured. The girls were shifted to a nearby hospital.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 3^rd, 2014.