The tense standoff was triggered Wednesday, July 9, after police and paramilitary forces patrolling the province’s Hangu district detained seven suspected militants with links to the Taliban group, local police station chief Jehangir Khan told BosNewsLife.
"There are about 35 policemen in Do-Aabba police station and the armed Taliban have surrounded the building from all directions," Khan said, adding that the seven arrested had been shifted to another police station.
POLICE REINFORCEMENTS
He said police reinforcements were called in while a local tribal elders were trying to broker a peaceful solution to end the of Do-Aabba Police Station. Hangu district has a history of violence between minority Shiite sect Muslims and majority Sunni sect Muslims and is close to tribal areas bordering Afghanistan.
Christians have also suffered under attacks and kidnappings in the region, where pro-Taliban militants try to establish Shariah, or Islamic, law. Police and other law enforcement agencies sway very little control there. The latest tensions came after suspected militants were involved in seven successive blasts elsewhere in Pakistan, in the city of Karachi, killing at least two people and injuring around 50 others.
Sources with close knowledge about the situation told BosNewsLife that the attackers targeted suburbs of the city. Intelligence sources said that the militants attempted to provoke ethnic violence in the area.
Eyewitnesses told BosNewsLife that the first blast took place near Banaras Chowk area in the evening hours. Two speeding coaches collided due to the panic created by the blast, resulting in a number of injuries, witnesses said. While the injured were shouting for help, another blast reportedly rocked the Banaras Zainab Market within five minutes of the first explosion.
ANOTHER BLAST
Yet another blast took place when an explosive device planted on a motorcycle parked near the fruit vendors at Banaras Chowk went off. Several people were reportedly injured by splinters from the three home-made explosive devices.
Some of the people present there hurled stones at the police vehicles to express their anger and protest against the blast, accusing a political group of involvement in the blasts, BosNewsLife established.
Amidst the protest, another blast occurred hit a public bus in nearby Qasba Colony, created more devastation and caused injuries. Soon after, a rickshaw Pak Colony area exploded. That was not the end. Some Muslim residents of Bara Board area in Karachi said when they were coming out of their mosque for prayers, three persons parked a Suzuki Mehran car in front of a house. Five minutes later, the car apparently exploded, injuring seven children.
NO TIME
There was no time to recover from the shock of the previous blast, as two motorcyclists wearing helmets came and threw a hand grenade inside a house and fled, injuring four children and some female members of the family in the house, local residents told media. They were immediately shifted to a nearby hospital, news reports said.
Another bomb exploded in a taxi near Hyderi Children School in North Nazimabad , injuring a number of passers-by, and later a truck exploded at the Shahrah-e-Noorjahan area, causing an unknown number of injuries.
Witnesses said panic gripped several parts of Karachi, and most of the petrol pumps were closed amid fears that an angry mob could torch them. Capital City Police Officer Karachi Waseem Ahmed told BosNewsLife that Karachi "was put on high alert" and that he had ordered police patrolling throughout the city.
There were other reports of intermittent firing by armed militants in several other locations, but there were no reports of causalities there. These localities included a road near offices of national dailies Jang and The News, BosNewsLife learned. (NEWS WATCH is a regular look at key news developments impacting the Church or compassionate professionals).
