By Staff Reporter
KARACHI: Militants rammed a vehicle into a paramilitary base in Karachi on Saturday, triggering a gun battle that killed at least three paramilitary Rangers personnel and four attackers, in the first assault on the country’s commercial capital claimed by a faction of the Pakistani Taliban in years.
The attack on the Sindh Rangers headquarters in the Gulistan-e-Jauhar neighbourhood began when assailants drove a vehicle into the outer barricade of the compound before storming the building and hurling hand grenades, police officials said.
Jamaat-ul-Ahrar, a militant offshoot of the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), claimed responsibility for the assault — a rare incursion by the northwestern-based group into Karachi, a megacity of some 20 million people that serves as Pakistan’s financial and commercial engine.
“At least three Rangers personnel have been martyred in the terrorist attack,” a senior police official told reporters. “Four terrorists have also been eliminated, and the body of the fifth terrorist — who was the suicide bomber — has also been found.”
A sixth militant was captured alive, wounded, the official added.
Sindh Inspector General Javed Alam Odho confirmed the death toll and said a mopping-up operation was underway, with the area sealed by Special Security Unit (SSU) commandos, Anti-Terrorist Force personnel and Rangers. Witnesses at the scene said firing had ceased and the situation was calm by late evening.
Police Surgeon Dr Summaiya Syed confirmed at least one paramilitary trooper had been hospitalised with gunshot wounds to the leg.
Rescue 1122 Sindh said it had dispatched teams from its central command-and-control centre following reports of an explosion near Gulistan-e-Jauhar Block 5. The emergency service’s chief operating officer, Dr Abid Jalaluddin Sheikh, was also sent to the scene on the directives of the Chief Minister’s Adviser on Rehabilitation Gyan Chand Essrani.
Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah said he had taken notice of the attack and directed the provincial police chief and Karachi’s additional inspector general to submit a detailed report. Home Minister Ziaul Hasan Lanjar separately ordered the additional inspector general to provide a full account of the incident as soon as possible.
Authorities had not issued a formal public statement on the assault by Saturday evening.
Saturday’s attack was the most significant militant strike on Karachi in nearly two years. In October 2024, a bombing near Karachi’s international airport killed one person and wounded 11 others, including foreign nationals. That attack was claimed by the Baloch Liberation Army (BLA), the separatist group that has repeatedly targeted Chinese interests in the city. Two suspects were arrested in connection with that bombing in November 2024.
Before that, the last major assault in Karachi was in February 2023, when gunmen attacked the city’s police headquarters on Sharea Faisal. Army special forces, Rangers and police fought the attackers — three TTP militants — for several hours before killing all of them. Four people died and 19 were wounded in that siege.
Jamaat-ul-Ahrar has historically operated primarily in the northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, targeting civilians, security personnel and government officials. Saturday’s attack signals an extension of the group’s operational reach into Pakistan’s south.
The assault comes against a backdrop of sharply deteriorating national security. Pakistan recorded 128 terrorist attacks in May, a 27 percent increase from 101 in April, according to the Pakistan Institute for Conflict and Security Studies, reversing two consecutive months of improvement. The surge was driven primarily by escalating violence in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan.
Copyright © 2021 Independent Pakistan | All rights reserved
