PESHAWAR, Nov 14: Two foreign journalists were injured on Friday after they were attacked in Peshawar. The journalists were on their way to an unspecified place to interview a militant leader.

One of the wounded journalists, Sami Yousufzai of Afghanistan, told Dawn that he, along with a Japanese journalist Yotskura Motoki, was in the Hayatabad locality when armed men attacked them.

However, police disputed Mr Yousufzai’s claim, saying that the journalists were attacked in the tribal area adjacent to the upscale Hayatabad Township.

“The journalists had entered tribal area without permission,” said Hayatabad ASP Jawad, adding that they had violated rules. “As the incident did not occur in the limits of Peshawar district, police are not responsible for their protection,” he said.

Sami Yousufzai, who works for US magazine Newsweek, suffered two bullet injuries in his right shoulder and left side of the chest. He was first taken to the Hayatabad Medical Complex and later shifted to the Lady Reading Hospital, where his condition is stated to be out of danger.

Motoki sustained a bullet injury in his right ankle. He was reportedly taken to Islamabad.

Mr Yousufzai said Japanese journalist Motoki was the bureau chief in Islamabad and Kabul for the Asahi Shimbun newspaper.

“Earlier our meeting point was Charsi restaurant in University Town, but the leader told us on phone to come to Hayatabad,” he said, adding that when they reached near Al-Noor school in Phase-I, unidentified gunmen attacked them.

Mr Yousufzai said he was driving his car while Motoki was in a chauffer-driven car. The attackers were three in number, but one of them opened fire with a pistol. They were bearded, wearing light green clothes. “The attackers stopped our cars, tried to shoot me in the head, but I pushed the pistol and the bullet grazed my shoulder,” Yousufzai said. He refused to disclose the name of the leader. However, he said, the leader was an Afghan national and accused him of being involved in the attack.

Police sources said the journalists were returning from the Khyber Agency after interviewing a militant leader when they came under attack.

A senior bureaucrat claimed that the Japanese journalist had told officials that minutes after they parked their cars at a taxi stand at the road to Shahkus, in Peshawar, a group of three people asked them to come to Shahkas for the interview. When the journalists refused to walk up to the men, the three opened fire on them, said the official, quoting the Japanese journalist.

Investigation officer Zahir Shah Khan, recalling the journalists’ statement, said that they were waiting for someone at a taxi stand at the Shahkus road when armed men fired at them from a nearby canal, which was in the limits of the Khyber Agency.

Mr Yousufzai had earlier figured in another controversy over four years ago when he, an American freelance journalist, Eliza Griswold, and his driver Mohammad Saleem were arrested by security forces on April 21, 2004, at a checkpoint when they were reportedly trying to enter the tribal area.

The American journalist was released the same day and subsequently deported, whereas Mr Yousufzai remained missing for over a month.

He was released from a lock-up in Miramshah, North Waziristan, by the tribal authorities on June 2, 2004, after a habeas corpus petition was filed before the Peshawar High Court against his detention.

The authorities claimed that he was sentenced under the FCR and was released after completion of a one-month prison term.