PESHAWAR: Gunmen on a motorbike shot dead a senior member of the country´s polio eradication campaign, police said Sunday, in the latest attack on immunisation teams by extremists.
Attempts to eradicate polio in Pakistan have been hit by militant attacks on inoculation teams that have claimed more than 100 lives since December 2012.
Doctor Zakaullah Khan, a seasoned member of Peshawar´s polio vaccination campaign near the country´s restive tribal belt, was killed late Saturday when gunmen on a motorbike opened fire near his house, a senior police official told media.
Imtiaz Ahmad, a provincial spokesman for the immunisation campaign, also confirmed the killing.
A faction of the Pakistani Taliban, Jamaat-ul-Ahrar, on Sunday claimed responsibility for the attack. In a statement, sent to media, the group´s spokesman Ehsanullah Ehsan vowed to carry out more attacks.
Militant’s opposition to all forms of inoculation grew after the CIA organised a fake vaccination drive to help track down Al-Qaeda´s former leader Osama Bin Laden. —INP
