7 more aid providers shot, killed in Pakistan

A father of an aid worker, who was killed by gunmen, mourns the death of his daughter at a hospital in Swabi, Pakistan, Tuesday, Jan. 1, 2013. Gunmen in northwest Pakistan killed at least five female teachers and two aid workers on Tuesday in an ambush on a van carrying workers home from their jobs at a community center, officials said. (AP Photo/Mohammad Sajjad)
A father of an aid worker, who was killed by gunmen, mourns the death of his daughter at a hospital in Swabi, Pakistan, Tuesday, Jan. 1, 2013. Gunmen in northwest Pakistan killed at least five female teachers and two aid workers on Tuesday in an ambush on a van carrying workers home from their jobs at a community center, officials said. (AP Photo/Mohammad Sajjad)

— Gunmen on motorcycles sprayed bullets at a van carrying employees from a community center Tuesday, killing five female teachers and two aid workers, but sparing a child whom they took out of the vehicle before opening fire.

The director of the group that employed the seven said he suspects that the shooting is the latest in a series of attacks targeting anti-polio efforts in Pakistan. Some militants oppose the vaccinations, accusing health workers of being spies for the U.S. and alleging that the vaccine is intended to make Muslim children sterile.

Last month, nine people working on an anti-polio vaccination campaign were shot and killed. Four of those shootings were in the northwest where Tuesday’s attack took place.

The attack was another reminder of the risks to women educators and aid workers from Islamic militants who oppose their work. The shooting was inthe same conservative province where militants shot and seriously wounded 15-yearold Malala Yousufzai, an outspoken activist for girls’ education, in October. Yousufzai was shot in the head but survived and is now recovering in Britain.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the latest shootings.

The teachers and the health workers - one man and one woman - were killed in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province on their way home from the community center in the town of Swabi, where they were employed at the center’s medical clinic and primary school. Their driver was injured.

Javed Akhtar, the director of Support With Working Solution, said the medical clinic vaccinated children against polio, and many of the nongovernmental organization’s staff had taken part in immunization campaigns.

Militants in the province have blown up schools and killed female educators. They have also kidnapped and killed aid workers, viewing them as promoting a foreign, liberal agenda.

Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, formerly called the Northwest Frontier province, borders the tribal areas of Pakistan along the frontier with Afghanistan to the west. Militant groups such as the Taliban have used the tribal areas as a stronghold from which to wage war in Afghanistan and against the Pakistani government. Often that violence has spilled over into Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.

In 2007, the Taliban led by Maulana Fazlullah took over the scenic Swat Valley, marking the height of their strength there. The Pakistani military later pushed the militant group from the valley, but the Taliban have repeatedly tried to reassert themselves.

The injured driver in Swabi told investigators that the gunmen stopped the vehicle and removed a boy - the son of one of the women - before opening fire, said police officer Fazal Malik. The woman’s husband rushed to the scene after receiving a phone call alerting him to the shooting.

“I left everything and rushed towards the spot. As I reached there I saw their dead bodies were inside the vehicle and he [his son] was sitting with someone,” said Zain ul Hadi.

According to the van’s driver, Abdul Majid, the gunmen positioned their motorcycles in the middle of the road, pulled out pistols andopened fire on the van.

“I think the attackers were already waiting for us,” said Majid, speaking from his bed at a hospital in the northwest city of Peshawar, where he was being treated for gunshot wounds in his left arm and rib cage. “After they finished firing, they just drove off.”

Swabi Police Chief Abdur Rasheed said most of the women killed were ages 20-22. He said four gunmen on two motorcycles fled the scene and have not been apprehended.

Support With Working Solution conducts education and health programs and runs the community center in Swabi, Akhtar said. The group has been active in the city since 1992 and started the Ujala Community Welfare Center in 2010, he added. Ujala means “light” in Urdu.

The center is financed by the Pakistani government’s Poverty Alleviation Program and a German organization, said Akhtar.

He said the nongovernmental organization also runs health and education projects in the South Waziristan tribal area, as well as health projects in the cities of Tank and Dera Ismail Khan and the regions of Lower Dir and Upper Kurram. All of those cities and regions are in northwest Pakistan, the area that has been most affected by the ongoing fight with militants opposed to the government.

Aid groups such as Support With Working Solution often play a vital role in many areas of Pakistan where the government has been unable to provide services such as medical clinics or schools.

Many aid groups that also work in the region are familiar with the persistent threat that militant groups pose, but the scale and viciousness of Tuesday’s attack worried even veteran campaigners.

Maryam Bibi, who founded an organization called Khwendo Kor, which carries out education and development programs in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and the nearby tribal areas, said she and many of her employees live in fear that they will be targeted next.

“I’m really very worried now because our girls go to the field. Our work is in the villages,” said Bibi. She said many of the female employees of such organizations are already under pressure from relatives and a culture that frowns on women working outside the home and mixing with men.

“On top of that, they’re shot dead,” she said.

In some areas like the northwest, aid groups have had to work to overcome community fears that they are promoting a foreign agenda at odds with local traditions and values.

But many residents in Swabi said the school and medical center provided a vital service to the community, and they mourned those who were killed.

Murad Khan said his daughter was studying at the primary school, which provided free books and uniforms to students. He said many people in the area are worried that the school and clinic will close.

“This school is like a gift for all of us, the poor people of the village,” he said. “People in our area are sad.”

The nongovernmental organization director said all projects will be suspended as security measures are reviewed, but he vowed that they would resume soon.

He said the nongovernmental organization had not received any threats before the attack.

So far, Pakistani authorities have been unable to halt the Taliban’s long-standing campaign against Pakistan’s education system, which the group regards as secular and therefore un-Islamic. Last year, at least 96 schools were damaged or destroyed by militants, according to Human Rights Watch. In 2011, militants attacked 152 schools.

In the country’s northwest, more than half of the schools destroyed have yet to be rebuilt. At least 600,000 children in northwestern Pakistan have missed a year or more of school because of militant attacks or threats, according to the Society for the Protection of the Rights of the Child, an Islamabad-based nongovernmental organization.

In the southern city of Karachi, officials said four people were killed when a bomb in a parked motorcycle exploded amid a crowd of buses for political workers returning from the rally held by the Muttahida Qaumi Movement. The movement is the dominant political party in Karachi.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack.

Dr. Saghir Ahmed, the provincial health minister, said that in addition to the dead, 41 people were injured.

Information for this article was contributed by Rebecca Santana, Zarar Khan, Riaz Khan and Adil Jawad of The Associated Press; and by Alex Rodriguez, Zulÿqar Ali and Muqaddam Khan of the Los Angeles Times.

Front Section, Pages 1 on 01/02/2013

Upcoming Events