Tribal elder killed, sons injured in Bajaur IED attack

Agency official says Malik Younus was on forefront of anti-Taliban peace militia

PESHAWAR: A senior member of an anti-Taliban militia in Salarzai Tehsil of Bajaur Agency was killed while three others, including two of his sons, were injured in a bomb attack on Tuesday morning, officials said.

“Malik Muhammad Younus was killed while two of his sons and a guard were critically injured when a roadside remotely controlled bomb went off near his vehicle,” a security official from Bajaur Agency told The Express Tribune.



Malik Younus was on the forefront of the anti-Taliban peace militia raised in the area in 2008 and he was also a former agency councilor, the official added.

Meanwhile, doctors at the local hospitalwhere the injured are being treated, said all the injured are in critical condition.

Recently, the attacks on pro-government tribal elders in Bajaur have increased for their support to government. Militants have been consistently targeting tribal leaders since 2001. Calculated estimates suggest that more than 1,115 tribal leaders were gunned down so far in the militancy-stricken northern areas of the country.

Unidentified militants had shot dead a tribal malik in Mamond tehsil on Sunday evening. Decease Malik Naeem was a resident of Lar Kalay, Bajaur Agency and was killed by unidentified armed men around 6:30 pm, an official of the political administration said.

Last month, a pro-government tribal elder was killed and his son was wounded when a roadside bomb hit their vehicle in the town of Bakakhel, 150 kilometres south of Peshawar. Malik Sayed Ali Wazir, who headed an anti-Taliban militia in the town, died on the way to hospital while his son was fighting for his life, Tahir Khan, a senior police official in neighbouring Bannu district said.



The army in June last year began a long-awaited drive to clear insurgent bases in the district after a bloody attack by the Taliban on Karachi airport sank faltering peace hopes. The army has intensified its offensive since the Taliban’s massacre of 153 people, 134 of them children, in the Army Public School (APS) in Peshawar last December.