Pakistan: Gunmen attack polio team, kill policeman
PTI | May 20, 2013
ISLAMABAD: Militants on Monday attacked a team of polio vaccinators in
the restive
Bajaur tribal region of northwest Pakistan, killing a security
personnel.
The members of the polio vaccination team were unharmed, officials were
quoted as saying by TV news channels.
The attackers gunned down a paramilitary personnel protecting the
vaccinators.
Pakistan is one of only three countries where the polio virus is
endemic.
Taliban
factions in the country's northwest have banned polio vaccination
campaigns over the past two years.
Health experts have estimated that thousands of children have been left
vulnerable to polio in
Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province and the tribal areas.
In April, a policeman was killed and another seriously injured when
militants attacked a team of polio vaccinators in Mardan town of
Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa.
In January, six women and a man working for a NGO involved in the polio
vaccination campaign were shot dead in Swabi district.
In December, eight volunteers involved in a polio vaccination drive were
gunned down in a string of attacks in the southern port city of Karachi
and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa.
The attacks prompted UN agencies to withdraw their workers from the
campaign.
Copyright © 2013 Bennett, Coleman & Co. Llc
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