Targeted: Drug dealer shot dead

In a separate incident, body of teenage girl found.

PESHAWAR: A man was shot dead in Mattani Bazaar in what appears to be a targeted killing. Police said Ismail, a local, was shot by unidentified gunmen late Saturday night. Local elders told The Express Tribune Ismail was a drug dealer who supplied hashish as well as heroin. They suspected he was killed by Taliban militants as he had no known enmity. “The incident took place in the dark of night and the killers managed to flee after carrying out the cold-blooded murder,” one of them said.

The elder added that locals were no stranger to violent attacks by the Taliban, but the army operation against the militants in North Waziristan brought about a period of relative calm.

Body found

The body of a woman appearing to be in her late teens was found on Sunday from the fields in Kharkai Village, which falls in the jurisdiction of the Daudzai police.

Police took the body and shifted it to the police station.

“She is a young woman. Most probably an Afghan national who was shot and her body was dumped in the fields,” said an official of the police station. He said the identity of the woman was yet to be established, but an FIR had been registered and an investigation was under way.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 1^st, 2014.