Police say attack was foiled by timely action of security forces
‘I shot one of them dead... The second guy saw me and... he took out a grenade. I shot him twice in his hand and his weapon fell down. I then shot him in the head as he tried to pull out the grenade pin’
At least seven persons including four terrorists were killed and seven others injured in a terrorist attack on the Karachi Stock Exchange on Monday, police said.
All the four heavily armed terrorists, who were young men, were shot dead by police and paramilitary Rangers.
Two private security guards of the stock exchange and a police sub-inspector were killed by the terrorists.
Police said that the terrorist attack on the stock exchange foiled by the timely action of the law enforcement forces.
The attackers had Kalashnikovs, pistol and hand grenade that they used during the attack. They were wearing jackets. They reached the venue in a car that the police later impounded.
The stock exchange building was cleared after a couple of hours of the attack. Operation in the adjoining area continues to search any hiding terrorist.
Stock exchange president Farrukh Khan said that normally 6,000-8,000 people are present in the building but due to COVID-19 much less persons were inside the premises. Juice packets and some other eatables were recovered from the possession of the terrorists, who were wearing joggers.
The terrorists entered the main gates of the building firing indiscriminately. The security guard, police and Rangers countered them. In the exchange of fire, the terrorists and others were killed.
Farrukh Khan said that the attackers could not make their way into the main building and the trading hall. He said the police and Rangers engaged them inside the main gate and outside of the building.
He said that the powerful action by the law enforcement agencies averted any major loss of life.
Police surgeon Dr Qarar Ahmed Abbasi said that five to six injured persons have been brought at Dr Ruth Pfau Civil Hospital Karachi for treatment.
The stock exchange building was sealed after the incident. Sindh Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah said that the terrorist strike was an attack on Pakistan.
Pakistan’s military praised the swift response of the city’s security forces, while the Karachi police released a video of one member from a provincial security unit describing the firefight.
“I shot one of them dead.... The second guy saw me and... he took out a grenade. I shot him twice in his hand and his weapon fell down. I then shot him in the head as he tried to pull out the grenade pin,” said Mohammad Rafiq, a member of an elite provincial rapid response team.
The video of the officer was shared widely online, with social media users calling Rafiq a hero.
The Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA) claimed responsibility in a message sent to AFP, saying an elite unit of fighters had carried out the assault.
The separatists have launched a string of high-profile attacks across the country in recent years — including in the southern port city.
The BLA is one of several insurgent groups fighting primarily in Pakistan’s southwestern Balochistan province, which has been rocked by separatist and sectarian violence for years.
The group has targeted infrastructure projects and Chinese workers in Pakistan multiple times in recent years, including a brazen daylight attack on Bejing’s consulate in Karachi that killed four people in 2018.
In May last year, the BLA attacked a luxury hotel near the Afghan border at Gwadar, where a port development is the flagship project of a multi-billion dollar national infrastructure project funded by China.
Last year, the US State Department designated the BLA as a global terrorist group, making it a crime for anyone in the United States to assist the militants and freezing any US assets they may have.
Following Monday’s attack Pakistani authorities vowed to strike back against any group found responsible for the onslaught, promising to dismantle their networks and destroy their bases.
“An investigation has been launched and very soon we will reach their masterminds,” Interior Minister Ijaz Ahmad Shah said in a video message posted after the attack.
Business continued as usual at the Karachi stock exchange after the attack.