Maoist attack on India police patrol leaves 16 dead

 

 

11 members of the national paramilitary CRPF were killed along with 4 members of the police force.

RAIPUR (AFP) - Maoist rebels killed at least 15 members of India s security forces Tuesday in a massive attack in restive Chhattisgarh state, less than a month before the country holds elections, police said.

Security officials and police sources said the victims were all killed when up to 200 rebels ambushed a patrol in forests to the south of the state capital Raipur before a major gun battle erupted.
Eleven members of the national paramilitary Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) were killed along with four members of the state police force, said Mukesh Gupta, one of Chhattisgarh s most senior police officers.
"As of now, a total of 11 CRPF, four policemen and one civilian have died," Gupta told AFP.
Others suggested the death toll was even higher.
Rajinder Kumar Vij, the head of anti-Maoist operations in the central state, put the number of CRPF personnel dead at 15 and said that five state policemen had also been killed.
There were no figures on the number of Maoist casualties.
The forces were involved in an operation to clear and open a road in Sukma district when the rebels detonated a landmine and started firing indiscriminately, Vij told AFP.
"The attack sparked a gun battle that lasted about three hours."
Several people were injured in the attack and were being airlifted to Raipur for treatment. Security reinforcements have been rushed to the area, along with top state government officials.

Gupta said the attack took place at around 10:30am in a heavily-forested area during the operation to clear the road some 400 kilometres (250 miles) from Raipur.
"The attack was on one of our police parties as the Naxalites (Maoists) have been frustrated at our increased presence in the area," he said.
"We don t yet know the casualties on the attackers side... It is difficult for us because of the topography of the area.

"The attack was close to the site of an ambush in May last year on a convoy carrying members of India s ruling Congress party in which 24 people were killed, including the state party president and his son.
The latest deaths will heighten fears of unrest in the Maoists  stronghold in the build-up to the nationwide elections which begin in early April.
Voting will take place in Chhattisgarh in three phases, on April 10, 17 and 24.
The Maoists, who have been described by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh as the country s most serious internal security threat, have been fighting since 1967 for a communist society by toppling what they call India s "semi-colonial, semi-feudal" form of rule.
The insurgency is believed to have cost tens of thousands of lives, with much action focused around the insurgent-dominated, so-called "Red Corridor" stretching through central and eastern India.
In 2010, rebels killed 35 people in a landmine attack on a bus in Chhattisgarh. The explosion tore the front off the bus, killing 24 civilians and 11 police personnel.
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source:dunya news

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Sindh govt busy in singing, dancing while children starve to death: Imran Khan

 

 

 

Imran Khan demanded of Sindh government to provide immediate medicine and food items to affectees.

ISLAMABAD (Dunya News) – Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan termed Sindh government responsible for Tharparkar’s drought tragedy on Saturday, Dunya News reported.
Government is busy in cultural festivals while thousands of citizens suffer from shortage of food, he said.
PTI Chief expressed concerns over conditions of drought-stricken citizens of Tharparkar. He said that Sindh government, despite having all resources, handed over the Tharparkar citizens to drought and famine adding that it is highly regrettable.
Imran Khan demanded of Sindh government to provide immediate medicine and food items to the affectees. People are targeted by terrorism in Karachi while poor are killed by food shortage and poverty in rural areas of Sindh, he said.
It merits mentioning here that Tharparkar drought has worsened to a dangerous level, raising the death toll of starving children to 33, Dunya News reported on Thursday.
Reportedly, shortage of food and drought has left people of Tharparkar fighting for their lives.
The famine is ongoing for the past 3 years in Chachru Tharparkar; and according to Mathi hospital sources, the death toll of starving children has reached to 32 only in the past one month.
According to Dr Abdul Jalil Bargari, starvation has caused death of 121 children thus far.
Confirming the number of deaths, the health department has expressed concerns.
At least 6 districts of Tharparkar desert is hit by the famine and drought causing the situation to turn extreme.
Meanwhile, no notice by the Sindh government has been taken thus far despite dozens of deaths.
It is pertinent to mention here that Sindh government has dozens of employees dedicated to a number of projects related to food security and crises management with studies sponsored by Asian Development Bank and United Nations.
According to Sindh government’s finance department’s Public Private Partnership (PPP) Unit website, the government lacks wheat storage capacity by 40-50% which causes ‘intense’ wastage of food.

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Mayhem in the capital: Gun-and-suicide attack kills 11 at district courts

 Mayhem in the capital: Gun-and-suicide attack kills 11 at district courts
 

ISLAMABAD: 

A regular Monday morning at the Islamabad district courts turned into a scene of death and destruction when two suicide bombers and their armed accomplices attacked the compound, killing 11 people, including an additional sessions judge, and injuring over two dozen others.

By noon, the labyrinthine and congested compound of the district courts in Sector F-8 echoed with a silence that only death can master.

Police put the number of attackers at three to four. They entered the district courts through an entrance in the back. Later in the day, it transpired that the attackers belonged to a little-known militant group called Ahrarul Hind.

“We claim responsibility for the attack,” a purported spokesman for the group told The Express Tribune by phone from somewhere in Afghanistan.

The spokesman, who said he was speaking on behalf of the group’s leader Umer Mansoor, opposed the ongoing peace dialogue. “We do not favour the ceasefire and peace talks as it is un-Islamic,” he added. “Our main demand is implementation of Sharia [law] and it has not been mentioned in the talks.”

The court compound, a poorly guarded area with defunct body scanners and over 20 side street entrances, had around 50 policemen on security duty at the time of the attack, according to police officials.

None could effectively neutralise the attackers, who the police said were in their mid-20s, wore short beards and khaki shalwar kameez.

“Three gunmen opened fire as soon as they entered the area,” Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan said.

Eyewitnesses, most of whom put the number of attackers between four and seven, said they started firing near the courts of civil judges Naveed Khan and Azhar Nadeem, who also sustained injuries.

“The firing lasted for around 15 minutes,” SSP Operations Muhammad Rizwan told The Express Tribune. During this time, eyewitnesses said the gunmen ‘roamed freely’ through the narrow streets lined with lawyers’ chambers, firing at will.

Lawyers said the death toll could have been higher if a hand grenade hurled by one of the attackers into the Waqar Gillani hall, a cafeteria-like area where lawyers huddle in the morning, had actually exploded. Some eyewitnesses said the attackers were only targeting government servants and lawyers and told other civilians to leave the premises. There was also speculation about the kind of cases that a judge killed in the attack was hearing or had heard in the past to fix the motive.

But police said it was ‘definitely a terrorist attack’ and an initial investigation report submitted to the interior ministry by security agencies stated “the attackers had no specific target”.

Medics said 29 people were injured in the attack – three of them critically.

The dead included people who were in court for hearings, a police constable, lawyers and Additional Sessions Judge Rafaqat Awan.

Awan was hunted down in a chamber inside his court by one of the gunmen, according to Muhammad Banaras, a Munshi at the district courts. “The gunman shot straight at the judge,” he said.

Awan was known for rejecting a petition by the Shuhada Foundation seeking registration of FIR against former military ruler Pervez Musharraf for the 2007 Lal Masjid operation.

The attackers used hand grenades, automatic rifles and suicide vests during the attack, Rizwan said. IGP Sikandar Hayat confirmed that two suicide bombers blew themselves up at separate locations inside the compound.

The worst hit was Block number 3, where the attacker who had shot Awan exploded after being hit in a fire exchange with an Anti-Terrorist Squad officer. The block included Awan’s court and the courts of two additional sessions judges Muhammd Adnan and Sikandar Khan, who escaped in time before the blast.

Their courtrooms, however, were destroyed in the blast.

Shattered white-tinted glass littered the floor of the alley in front of the courts. Inside the rooms, furniture and file cabinets were smashed violently against each other. Throughout the compound, there were bullet holes staring back from windows and blood stains and tiny bits of flesh strewn on the streets.

The second bomber blew himself up a few blocks to the south of Awan’s court, causing a crater. Police found the head and legs of one of the bombers. Intelligence sources claimed one gunman, wearing a red sweater, escaped.

Police were conducting search operations in the twin cities to find him but no arrests were made till the filing of this report. The capital was put on high security alert and security was beefed in the city’s sensitive Red Zone.

Monday’s suicide blasts were the first in Islamabad since the 2011 suicide attack outside a private bank. A suicide bomber tried to blow himself up at a mosque in Bara Kahu in August 2013 but his vest malfunctioned and he was killed by a security guard. 

Posted By:: Muhammad Usman

Sources: express tribune

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Two bombs kill 13 of polio team escort

 

Posted by :: Muhammad Usman

KHYBER AGENCY -  Thirteen soldiers and a child were killed and eight others injured when two roadside bombs followed by gunfire targeted a polio vaccination team in tehsil Jamrud of restive Khyber Agency on Saturday, in the latest attack on efforts to combat the crippling disease.
Jamrud Assistant Political Agent (APA) Jahangir Azam Wazir said a group of paramilitary Khasadar and Levies soldiers assigned to escort anti-polio teams in Walomena rural area of Lashora were targeted with remote-controlled roadside bombs.
He said the troops were protecting a convoy of health workers who were on their way to administer anti-polio drops to children as part of a three-day campaign against polio that started Friday. The militants, who had taken positions on the nearby hills, also started firing at the soldiers after the bomb explosions, local tribesmen said.
“A convoy of three vehicles was taking polio workers to administer the drops and the bombs exploded after the first vehicle that was carrying polio workers crossed the spot,” Khan said. A second bomb was blasted when another vehicle of the forces came for the rescue. Thirteen soldiers and a child were killed on the spot, the APA said. Eight Khasadar troops were also wounded in the attack, Khan said. Two vehicles of force were also destroyed by the bombs, he said.
Soon after the incident, heavy contingents of security forces and the administration officials reached at the site. The area was cordoned off and wounded and dead were taken to Jamrud and Peshawar hospitals, sources said. The deceased included officers Akhtar Munir, Said Karim, hawaldar Taufeeq, Said Kamal, Saddam, Noor Wali, Mohammad Ullah, Qadeer, Ferhad, Riaz, Amjad and a small boy, Razaq.
Khyber Agency Political Agent Shahab Ali while talking to the media persons on his visit to the area said, the moral of Khasadar force and Levies is high and they will never hesitate to render sacrifice for the noble cause. He vowed that soon the culprits will be netted and brought to justice. Nobody had claimed responsibility for the attack till the filing of this report.
Due to security reasons the anti-polio drive could not be completed in the previously fixed time that ended on Friday; therefore, it was extended for a week to cover the whole 38 areas of tehsil Jamrud, health sources said. Rehman Khan, a senior health official in Khyber tribal district, said the polio campaign has been temporarily suspended in the Jamroud area. “We will resume administering of polio drops when the security situation is better,” he said.
Militant strikes and threats of violence have badly hampered campaigns to stamp out polio in Pakistan, one of only three countries where the disease remains endemic. Militant groups see vaccination campaigns as a cover for espionage, and there are also long-running rumours about polio drops causing infertility.
More than 40 people, including health workers and police guarding the teams which administer polio drops to children, have been killed in Pakistan since December 2012. Last week gunmen kidnapped a six-member polio vaccination team in southwest Pakistan. They were released two days later after the intervention of local tribal elders. Masked gunmen kidnapped another six-member polio vaccination team southwest of Peshawar earlier last month. Their whereabouts are currently unknown.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), Pakistan recorded 91 cases of polio last year, up from 58 in 2012. Pakistan’s failure to defeat polio stands in stark contrast to its neighbour and great rival India, which recently celebrated the eradication of polio three years after its last case. The WHO has warned that Peshawar, the main city of the northwest, is the world’s “largest reservoir” of polio. Afghanistan and Nigeria are the other countries where the disease persists. Victims are left dead, paralysed or with withered limbs.

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Blast in eastern Afghanistan kills 13

 



KABUL: Officials say a car packed with explosives blew up and killed 13 people including nine insurgents in eastern Afghanistan.
Dind Mohammad Darwesh, spokesman for the governor of Logar Province, said it was probably a case of militants killed by their own weapon.
He said it appeared the car was being prepared for a terror attack but that investigations are ongoing.
He said Sunday that those killed in the blast included nine insurgents, plus two women and two children who were nearby.
Darwesh had no further details. The area is a Taliban stronghold, and dangerous for journalists to independently verify claims.

Posted By ::: Muhammad Usman

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