QUETTA: Six members of a family, four children among them, were killed and six others injured in an attack on the Quetta-Sibi highway near Mithari area of Kech district on Tuesday.

Police sources said that the family of Meraj Khan Umrani, an officer in the local government, was going from Dera Murad Jamali to Quetta when armed men intercepted their vehicle and opened indiscriminate fire on it.

They said the armed men travelling in a car were chasing Mr Umrani’s vehicle from Dera Murad Jamali.

After receiving information about the incident security personnel rushed to the area and shifted bodies and the injured to district hospital in Sibi.

Quoting hospital sources Levies officials said that two of the injured were in critical condition.

The deceased were identified as Meraj Khan Umrani, his two sons, seven-year old Muddassar Khan and three-year old Sher Baz, and two daughters, six-year-old Wajiha and four-year-old Meena Bibi. The identity of a girl killed in the attack could not be identified.

They received multiple bullet wounds and died on the spot.

Mr Umrani’s wife Shamshad Bibi and his other relatives, Muzamil Hussain Umrani, Rakhshanda Bibi, Sadia Bibi, Ahmed Raza and Umairah Kaksoom, were injured in the attack.

The incident seems to be the outcome of an old enmity.

Levies officials have registered a case.

Published in Dawn, November 12th, 2014