BAJAUR AGENCY - At least six people including a pro-government tribal elder were killed when their vehicle hit an improvised explosive device (IED) planted along a roadside in Mamond tehsil of Bajaur Agency on Monday.
Officials and local people said the blast took place at around 8:00 am in the Bar Kamar area, some 22 kilometers northwest of Khar, the administrative headquarters of the Agency. They said Malik Mohammad Jan was on way from his native village Zagai to Khar in a vehicle along with driver and other companions when his vehicle was targeted with a remote -controlled bomb.
According to officials, the bomb went off when vehicle of the tribal elder was passing by a turn. As a result, all the people onboard were killed on the spot. The vehicle was also destroyed completely, said the officials.
The deceased were identified as Qari Fazal Rabi, Abdullah, Shahbuddin, Musafar Khan and Usman Khan. Soon after the blast, people of the nearby area and members of the peace committee rushed to the site of the incident and retrieved bodies and took them to the Agency Headquarters Hospital Khar for post-mortem.
No one has claimed responsibility for the attack, but officials of the administration believe that militants could be involved in the incident.
The incident could be a terrorism act according to preliminary report. Militants have been involved in attacks on pro-government elders in the past, said an official. Residents of the area said Malik Mohammad Jan had played a key role in elimination of militants from the region.
Later, personnel of security forces and Levies Force reached the area and initiated search operation in the region. The Monday bomb blast was the third terrorist attack on pro-government people in the agency during the last two weeks.
AFP adds: “An improvised explosive device planted along the roadside went off as the vehicle of a local pro-government tribal elder, Malik Muhammad Jan, passed by it, leaving him and five others dead,” senior district official Fayyaz-ul-Haq Sherpao told AFP.
He said Malik Muhammad Jan was a leading member of a local peace committee, which works to apprehend militants operating in their areas.
Another local official, Shah Nazeer, confirmed the incident and casualty toll.
Bajaur is one of seven semi-autonomous tribal districts along mountainous western border.
Pakistan began a long-awaited push to clear insurgent bases from the North Waziristan tribal district last June after a bloody Taliban attack on Karachi airport sank faltering peace talks.
The army has intensified its offensive since the Taliban’s massacre of 153 people, 134 of them children, in a school in Peshawar in December.