Unidentified gunmen killed four people on Tuesday when they opened fire on a vehicle in Hangu Bazaar following a kidnap attempt, officials said.Officials told Daily Times that gunmen opened fire on Malik Money ExchangeÂ’s vehicle at around 8am. The gunmen managed to escape and Hangu Bazaar was closed after the incident. The dead were identified as Ansar Ali Karbalai, Ayaz Ali, Hassan Afraz and Zahid.
Sources said the gunmen had been chasing the vehicle from the Riasan area.
Hangu District Co-ordination Officer (DCO) Syed Shahab Ali Shah condemned the incident. After a meeting in his office, he told reporters that it was not a target killing. The gunmen wanted to kidnap the people in the vehicle and when they resisted, they were shot at.
Shah said the Hangu-Kohat main road had been closed for traffic to avert any further incidents and it would be opened as the situation normalised.
Local Shia community spokesman Razzaq Ali told Daily Times that the incident aimed to create a sectarian strife between the Shia and Sunni communities in the area, as three of the dead were Shia. He also criticised Hangu police, especially the emergency squad, for failing to achieve their objective of securing the area as armed men were frequently seen roaming Hangu Bazaar. The force should therefore be abolished, he maintained.
The incident came a day after four people were killed in a bomb explosion in a Shia mosque in Dera Ismail Khan.