QUETTA/GWADAR: A fresh wave of violence swept through Balochistan’s insurgency-hit areas as two more security personnel were killed in an improvised explosive device blast in Awaran while bodies of as many kidnapped government employees were found in the neighbouring Kech district on Saturday.

This month Quetta alone witnessed three bomb attacks in which security personnel were targeted.

Also on Saturday, security forces claimed to have killed three suspected militants and arrested two in a gunbattle in remote Barkhan district.

Official sources said that personnel of the Frontier Corps were checking the Jhaho area in Awaran district to clear it of landmines when an IED exploded near an FC vehicle. Following the blast, armed men opened fire, they added.

“Two soldiers of the Frontier Corps lost their lives and three others were seriously wounded in the blast,” a spokesman for the FC said.

He also confirmed firing after the blast.

The sources said that the FC men were the target of the IED, which was exploded by a remote control.

They said that the FC troops deployed in the area rushed to the site of the attack and shifted the bodies and wounded to Awaran town whence the wounded were moved to the Combined Military Hospital in Khuzdar.

Security forces launched a search operation in the area after the blast to locate those involved in the attack. Some suspects were taken into custody for interrogation, the sources added.

Two more govt employees found shot dead

Bullet-riddled bodies of two more government employees, who had been kidnapped along with their three colleagues two weeks back from the Dashat area of Kech district, were found in the mountainous Saijee area.

Official sources in Gwadar said that the security forces found the bodies and shifted them to a Turbat hospital. The victims were identified as Fida Ahmed and Muhammad Ibrahim.

Hospital sources said that they were shot in the head and chest.

Earlier, bodies of three other government employees had been recovered in the same area three days back. They had gone to Dashat on May 15 along with two engineers to inspect development schemes on the instruction of the chief minister inspection team from where they were kidnapped by armed men and the security forces failed to trace their whereabouts.

‘BRA commander’ among three killed in Barkhan

The FC claimed to have killed three suspected militants, including an alleged commander of the outlawed Baloch Republican Army, and arrested their two accomplices during a search operation in Barkhan district.

A spokesman for the FC said that armed militants opened fire on security personnel when they were searching an area in Barkhan. The FC men returned fire. A heavy exchange of gunfire continued for some hours and when the guns fell silent three militants were killed.

“Three militants including a commander of the banned Baloch Republican Army have been killed,” the FC spokesman said, adding that two suspected militants were also arrested and arms and ammunition was also recovered.

Published in Dawn, May 29th, 2016