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Policeman guarding polio workers shot in Karachi

A doctor says the policeman is critically ill after a bullet passed through his skull

Afp January 19, 2015

The assailants, riding a motorcycle, open fire at the deceased. PHOTO: AFP

KARACHI: Gunmen on Monday wounded a policeman who was guarding a polio vaccination team in Karachi, the latest in a series of attacks on the teams in the country.

The attack took place on the first day of a four-day local anti-polio campaign in Orangi. Unidentified gunmen riding a motorbike opened fire at the team and then fled, police said.

"Two gunmen opened fire at the policeman who was on duty to guard the vaccinators," Ali Asif, a senior police official in the area, told AFP, adding that the vaccination campaign in the area had now been postponed.

The policeman is critically ill after a bullet passed through his skull, Doctor Mohammad Abid in the city's Abbasi Shaheed hospital told AFP.

Pakistan is one of only three countries where polio remains endemic. Attempts to stamp it out have been badly hit by opposition from militants and attacks on immunisation teams that have claimed 68 lives since December 2012.