QUETTA, Feb 21: Three traffic police personnel were shot dead by some people in the suburbs of the city on Thursday morning.

After the incident, traffic police all over the city stopped work in protest, left their posts and gathered at the Civil Hospital’s casualty department after the deaths of their colleagues.

Police said that sub-inspector Latif and two head constables were going on motorbikes when gunmen attacked them in the Killi Ismail area.

The sub-inspector died on the spot while head constables Mohammad Ayub and Bashir Ahmed were seriously injured. They were taken to the Civil Hospital where they died.

The armed men escaped after the attack. A spokesman for the banned Bloch Liberation Army (BLA) has claimed responsibility for the attack.

The traffic policemen blocked traffic on the main Jinnah Road. They raised slogans against the government and demanded protection, saying that more than half a dozen traffic police personnel had been killed in Quetta.