• Local security guard also killed
• IGP says slain DSP Raza worked against outlawed TTP, sectarian, ethnic and sub-nationalist groups
• CM orders killers’ arrest

KARACHI: A senior official of the Counter-Terrorism Department (CTD) and a private security guard were gunned down in Karimabad in a targeted attack on Sunday evening, police and hospital officials.

CTD official Raja Umar Khattab told Dawn that DSP Ali Raza, 45, went to his old neighbourhood, Shakeel Corporation, in Karimabad to meet his friends. As he got off his bulletproof vehicle, two assailants on a motorcycle emerged there, opened indiscriminate fire on him and rode away.

The police said that the bullets hit DSP Raza and private security guard Waqar who was standing there. They were taken to the Abbasi Shaheed Hospital where doctors pronounced the police officer dead on arrival.

The guard was shifted to the Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre, where he also died during treatment, the police added.

Police Surgeon Summaiya Syed told Dawn that the DSP had suffered “multiple gunshot injuries to chest, neck and head”. She said that his family did not allow doctors to conduct a full autopsy. She said that the guard had suffered bullet wounds to the chest.

DIG-CTD Asif Ejaz Shaikh told the media that the assailants fired 11 bullets. He said that he was provided with security as well as bombproof vehicle, but he was alone at the time of the incident.

The body was taken to an imambargah in Ancholi for his last rites.

Talking to Dawn, Inspector General of Police Ghulam Nabi Memon said that the slain officer had spent his career in the CTD working against not only the outlawed Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and sectarian groups but Lyari gangsters and Muttahida Qaumi Movement activists.

He had worked on different high-profile cases, but it would be premature to blame any group at this time or to assume that the assassination was related to Muharram, the IGP said, adding: “We believe he was targeted because of his background of working against different gangs.”

The police chief said that apparently the slain DSP did not like to travel with guards because of privacy.

Mr Khattab said that the slain DSP had extensively worked against TTP, banned militant, sectarian and sub-nationalist groups.

He said that DSP Raza was a close associate of slain CID SSP Chaudhary Aslam who was killed in a suicide attack in the metropolis in January 2014.

Expressing his sorrow and anger over the assassination of DSP Raza, Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah directed the IGP-Sindh to conduct an inquiry and arrest the killers.

Published in Dawn, July 8th, 2024