RAHIM YAR KHAN: At least 11 policemen were martyred and seven sustained injuries after kacha bandits attacked their vans with rockets in a riverine area of Punjab’s Rahim Yar Khan on Thursday.
The horrific attack occurred in the Machka area located in one of Rahim Yar Khan’s riverine areas.
Police officials told the media that two police vans with more than 20 cops were trapped in rainwater in the locality when bandits launched rockets at them.
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As a result of the fierce attack, nearly a dozen cops were martyred while seven others were wounded and four went missing, the police added.
Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi condemned the dacoits’ attack on Punjab police and paid tribute to the martyred cops.
He also prayed for the early recovery of the wounded policemen and pledged that the government would stand beside the families of the martyred cops.
Bandit groups in riverine areas have always been a hurdle in maintaining law and order for the provincial governments in Sindh and Punjab despite conducting multiple operations to eliminate them.
A National Action Plan implementation review committee decided in a meeting at the National Counter Terrorism Authority (Nacta) headquarters in April to launch a joint operation of Sindh and Punjab police forces against notorious dacoits of the kacha areas in Sindh.
The directives were issued by Interior Minister Naqvi who chaired the high-level meeting attended by the interior secretary, heads of Nacta and the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA), police chiefs of Punjab, Sindh, KP, Balochistan, Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK) and Gilgit Baltistan (GB) and provincial home secretaries.
