Prayer leader among two dead in shooting incidents

Karachi

Blood continues to be spilled in the metropolis as a pesh imam – prayer leader – was shot dead by assailants inside a mosque in the Gulistan-e-Jauhar area on Tuesday, while a man was killed and a security guard was injured when armed attackers opened fire on a car with government plates on Suparco Road.

Investigators identified the first victim as Habibur Rehman, a prayer leader at Masjid Siddiq Akbar located in Gulistan-e-Jauhar. Reports stated that Rehman, aged 42, was shot inside his office located on the mosque premises. Police said there were two attackers, one of whom entered the office on the pretext of collecting a form and shot Rehman at close range.

He was taken to the Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre (JPMC), where he succumbed to his injuries during treatment. There were reports that the police had later arrested a man in connection with the murder investigation.

Suparco Road shooting

In the day’s other attack, a person said to be a Space and Upper Atmosphere Research Commission (Suparco) employee was killed while another sustained injuries when armed gunmen opened fire on a vehicle on Suparco Road, near Dow University Hospital.

Initial reports said that two men on a motorcycle had opened fire at a vehicle carrying government registration plates on Suparco Road. The victim and the injured were identified as Idrees, 35, and Faisal Abbas, 25, respectively.

Later in the evening, however, police officials said the incident was a robbery attempt gone awry.

It was said that the attackers had tailed the car after its passengers had withdrawn cash from a bank on Sharea Faisal.

The police said that as the robbers approached the car, a security guard who was onboard the vehicle opened fire and, in the resultant shootout, both robbers and the car’s occupants suffered injuries. 

The injured, it was said, were shifted to a nearby hospital where two people – one a robber and the other a car passenger – succumbed to their wounds.