QUETTA, Dec 30: Five kidnappers were killed and four health workers rescued by the Levies personnel after a gunbattle in Murghazai area of the Pishin district on Friday. Another kidnapper was arrested.

“The armed men killed and arrested during the gunfight belong to the Mehsud tribe of South Waziristan,” an official of the Balochistan government told Dawn.

According to sources, an armed gang barged into a state-run basic health unit in Killi Haikalzai area and took away a medical officer and three staff members, among them a lady health visitor.

A Levies team, accompanied by the Pishin deputy commissioner, chased the kidnappers and pinned them down in Murghazai village. The kidnapers were asked to surrender and free the hostages but they attacked the security personnel with grenades and automatic weapons, the sources said. The kidnappers wanted to take the abducted people to South Waziristan.

According to sources, the kidnappers were trained and their link to the banned Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan could not be ruled out.

The arrested man was handed over to the ‘authorities concerned’ for interrogation.

About two weeks ago, six workers of the Balochistan Rural Support Programme, an NGO, were kidnapped from Barshor area near the Afghan border in Pishin district. Reports suggest that they have been taken to the lawless South Waziristan region.

The local administration has suspended over 40 Levies personnel, including six officers, for negligence.