KARACHI, April 4: Five policemen were gunned down by armed men who stormed into the Gulistan-i-Jauhar police station early Sunday morning. One policeman, Mohammad Hasan Jatoi, who put up resistance was wounded.

The policemen who lost their lives were sub-inspector Umeed Ali Merani, Sarfraz, Ashfaq, Ismail and George Ghulam. "No one has so far claimed responsibility for the attack. The motive of the shooting could not be ascertained immediately," a senior police official said.

Head constable Hasan Jatoi, who survived the attack, said the armed men attacked the police station before morning prayers. They did not go to the lock-up located between the two rooms where policemen were targeted. Two suspects of a dacoity case, Nawaz and Bashir, were in the lock-up, police said.

The inmates in the lock-up told Dawn that they did not see the assailants. However, they heard their voices as they entered the two rooms of the station, abused the policemen and sprayed them with bullets.

Most of the policemen suffered head injuries and died on the spot, hospital sources said. This correspondent saw two policemen lying dead in a pool of blood in the duty room and the three others in the other room.

Hearing the gunfire, Hasan Jatoi who was preparing for the morning prayers in the mosque on the premises of the police station got hold of his gun and opened fire at the attackers.

Two of the attackers suffered bullet wounds and fell on the ground. Surprised by the token resistance, the gunmen started firing towards the mosque. The makeshift building of the police station bore bullet marks on walls. Numerous bullet holes were seen on the outer wall of the mosque.

Investigators collected over 200 empties from the place. Talking to newsmen at the police station, provincial police chief Syed Kamal Shah described the incident as an act of terrorism and pledged early arrest of the killers.

Mr Shah said that 10 to 12 armed men had attacked the police station. They killed two policemen in one room and three in the other. The head constable claimed that his bullets had hit two of the attackers. However, the assailants succeeded in not leaving their injured accomplices behind.

Mr Shah said that the Gulistan-i-Jauhar police station was temporarily housed in a site office of a private construction company. Gulshan town police officer, SSP Abdul Khaliq Shaikh, quoted the injured policeman as saying that the attackers had come in three vehicles, but said that during initial investigation, police had found tracks of more vehicles.

"Some of the attackers were clad in trousers and shirts while others were wearing shalwar kameez" the SSP told Dawn. Talking to newsmen at the police station and at Garden Headquarters, Adviser to the CM for Home affairs Aftab Shaikh said that such acts of terrorism would not dampen the spirit of the police force.

He said that if terrorists were under the impression that such acts could destabilize the government they were grossly mistaken. According to police sources, the attackers had come to the police station with TT pistols and a Repeater gun and they got hold of two Klashnikoves from the premises and used all the weapons.

A senior police official, requesting anonymity, acknowledged that some sensitive agencies had recently picked up some important suspects from the Gulshan town.

The incident took place a day after the arrest of the Mohajir Qaumi Movement (Haqiqi) chief Afaq Ahmed, and four days after a sit-in staged in front of the same police station by activists of a religious alliance demanding release of their two workers.