QUETTA: At least nine people were killed and eight injured in two different firing incidents in Quetta and Awaran districts of Balochistan in less than 24 hours, officials said.

Superintendent of Police (SP), Imran Qureshi told Dawn.com that armed motorcyclists opened fire at a butcher shop in Sariab Road area of the Balochistan capital. He said three people sitting inside the shop were killed.

“The incident seems to be an act of targeted killing,” Qureshi said. The assailants drove away on their motorcycle after the attack.

In another incident, six people of Zikri community were killed and eight injured in a firing incident in Balochistan's Awaran district on late Thursday night, officials said.

Armed militants opened an indiscriminate fire at a worship place of Zikri sect in Pao area of Awaran.

A levies official, who requested anonymity owing to sensitivity of the matter, told Dawn.com via telephone that four militants tiding two motorcycles attacked the Zikirs’ worshiping place.

The attackers fled away on their motorcycles after the attack.

Levies personnel reached the area and shifted the dead bodies and injured to a nearby health unit. According to doctors, all the victims had received multiple bullet wounds and the condition of two of the injured was serious.

Panic prevailed in the remote village of Balochistan in the aftermath of cold blooded murder of six people. Zikris in the area had already been receiving threats by militants groups. However, there was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack.

The firing incidents have come a day after the killing of two journalists working for Online news agency and their accountant in Kabir Building area of Quetta’s Jinnah Road.

Armed men barged into the office of the local news agency and killed Irshad Mastoi, the Bureau Chief of Agency along with reporter Ghullam Rasool and accountant Muhammad Younas.