Gunmen kill at least 11 in two attacks in Pakistan’s Balochistan

No group has claimed responsibility for the attacks which took place on the Quetta-Taftan Highway.

Gunmen have killed 11 people in two separate attacks in the Balochistan province in southwestern Pakistan, bordering Afghanistan and Iran, officials have said.

Police on Saturday were searching for the assailants who killed nine people after abducting them from a bus on a highway on Friday. The same attackers also killed two people in another car they forced to stop.

Deputy Commissioner Habibullah Musakhel said the armed men had set up a blockade, then stopped the bus and went through the passengers’ ID cards. They took nine people with them, all from the eastern Punjab province, and fled into the mountains. Police later recovered nine bodies under a bridge about five kilometres (three miles) from the highway.

The attack took place on the Quetta-Taftan Highway N-40 in the vicinity of Sultan Charhai near Noshki, and 10 to 12 armed men were involved, Musakhel also told Pakistan daily, Dawn.

Earlier on Friday, the same gunmen had opened fire on a vehicle that tried to stop for their blockade, killing two and wounding six. A search for the perpetrators was under way, Musakhel said.

Passenger Sajjad Ahmed said there were 70 people on the bus. Masked men stopped the bus near the city of Nushki, took away nine people and told the driver to continue the journey, he told The Associated Press.

“We heard the armed men open fire on those people as we drove away,” he said. “We heard the sounds of firing. The driver took the bus to the closest police station. We didn’t know if those people were alive or not.”

Witness Zahid Imran, 46, told the AFP news agency that when the attackers boarded the bus they berated the abducted travellers,