Mortar Shelling Kills Two And Injures Several Others In Mohmand Agency Bordering Afghanistan

GHALANAI: Two persons including a minor boy of four years were killed and several others injured on Saturday in Mohmand Agency when some stray mortar shells fell in the villages of Charguli and Kamangara in tehsil Anbar to the north-east from here in the wee hours of the night, sources told. The deceased were identified as Niaz Gul son of Mian Gul and Choto son of Bad Shah Khan of Said Khan Kore, Charguli. Official sources told that these were the stray mortar shells that were mistakenly fell in the Mohmand area in the continuation of the Bajaur operation. Tehsildar of Anbar, Ihsanullah, told this correspondent that several mortar shells fired from the Khar area of Bajaur randomly landed in the Mohamnd territory that unfortunately took two lives of the innocent tribesmen. He also pledged that these people would be compensated with the support programme of the government. Hundreds of the villages started fleeing from the area to the safer abodes in a mass migration. A villager, Zarmullah, told that all those killed were poor farmers and had nothing to do with the Taliban. On the other hand, curfew imposed since October 28, for indefinite period continued which had suffered the residents of the area. Security forces’ sources have claimed to have arrested three persons, one of them identified as Muhammad Jan son of Said Ghani and two others in Yousaf Khel and Karappa respectively on the suspicion of being Taliban militants. In another incident, at Mamad Gat, some unknown militants attacked a patrolling party of security forces that led to a fierce battle between the two parties. According to details, a party of the Mohmand Rifles (MR) of the Mamad Gat wing was on routine patrolling when some miscreants near the bazaar attacked it. Security forces retaliated that resulted in a fierce gun battle that lasted for almost two hours.