MASTUNG: Four people, including three teenage boys belonging to Christian community, were injured when unknown armed men opened fire in a Christian colony in Mastung town, some 50 kilometres southwest of Quetta, on Monday evening.

The police said the boys were playing in the colony when unknown armed motorcyclists opened indiscriminate firing, injuring four people.

Soon after the incident, the police rushed to the site and shifted the injured children to Nawab Ghous Bakhsh Raisani Memorial Hospital in Mastung.

“We have received four people, including three teenagers, who had received bullet injuries,” hospital officials said, adding that all the four injured had been referred to Trauma Centre in Quetta.

People belonging to the Christian community blocked the Quetta-Karachi national highway near Mastung to protest the non-availability of ambulances in the hospital for shifting the injured children to Quetta. However, traffic was restored later in the evening after the deputy commissioner’s assurance.

The injured were identified as Wilson, Boby, Sanam and Pobail. The police said that assailants fled the scene after firing. Police and security forces launched a search operation to trace them.

Published in Dawn, August 9th, 2022