KARACHI: Within a week after the killing of an officer associated with the counter-terrorism department of police, the attacker with another hitman was gunned down in what police described as an encounter in Civil Lines on Saturday.

The pistols seized from the hitmen, identified as Sohail, alias Shooter, and Sarfraz, alias Kala, were sent for a forensic examination that confirmed one of them had been used in the murder of CTD ASI Shabab Haider.

Officer in charge of the CTD Raja Umer Khattab told Dawn that they were ‘professional criminals and drug peddlers’ affiliated with one of the several gangs in Lyari.

The officer said that acting on a tip-off about the presence of the suspected killers of ASI Haider, a police team conducted a targeted raid in Baloch Para, off Jehangir Road, in the early hours of Saturday. On seeing the police, the gunmen resorted to firing and in the ensuing exchange of fire, the two suspects were killed. The police seized two pistols from their custody and sent them to their forensic lab which later confirmed that the weapon seized from Sohail was used in the murder of the CTD officer.

Published in Dawn September 25th, 2016