KOHAT, Jan 15: Six employees of the Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission (PAEC), who had been kidnapped by armed men on Sunday night from their camp office near a uranium mining field in Karak district, were freed by police early on Monday morning after an encounter in which three kidnappers and a constable were killed.

Three vehicles taken away by the kidnappers were also found and a pick-up belonging to the kidnappers was seized.

Official sources told Dawn that only half an hour after the men had been kidnapped, at around 9:30am, a police team managed to find the place, near Gurguri, where the kidnappers had been hiding.

Police ordered the kidnappers who numbered 13 to surrender, but they opened fire. Police retaliated and the exchange of fire continued till about 2am, resulting in the death of police constable Naimatullah. Two of the three kidnappers killed in the exchange of fire were Abdus Sattar (of North Waziristan) and Inayatullah (of Buland Khel in Thall tehsil). Two kidnappers, Yaqoob Khan (of North Waziristan) and Sher Zaman (of Buland Khel in Thall tehsil), were injured. Other members of the gang managed to escape.

An injured kidnapper told interrogators that their local Taliban chief, Amir Ahmed Gul, had told them that they were going to attack a foreigners’ camp in Thall. He said they did not know that the chief would use them for kidnapping people. He said they were taking the kidnapped people and the vehicles to the seminary of Maulana Jalaluddin Haqqani near the cattle market in North Waziristan.

However, the interrogators said that the kidnappers were posing themselves as Taliban to misguide them.

The Teri and Banda Daud Shah police have registered a case under sections 302/324/353 of PPC and 5 Explosives Act 411/148/149/13 AO and 7 Anti-Terrorist Act. They have been also charged under section 17/3 of Haraba and 156.Police seized five hand-grenades, three Klashnikovs, four cellphones and Rs1,430 cash from the kidnappers.