Two policemen guarding a polio vaccination team were shot dead by militants in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s Orakzai district on Tuesday, following which two attackers were also killed, police said.

Pakistan and Afghanistan are the only countries where polio remains endemic, and vaccination teams are frequently targeted by militants waging a campaign against security forces.

On Monday, Pakistan launched a week-long vaccination campaign with the aim of immunising more than 45 million children under the age of five.

Malik Sikandar, a senior police officer in Orakzai, told AFP: “Two militants attacked policemen guarding a polio vaccination team.”

“One policeman died at the scene while the second succumbed to injuries” en route to hospital, he told AFP, adding that officers chased down and killed the two attackers and a local accomplice.

Another police official, Naveedullah Khan, confirmed the fatality and told AFP that two vaccination workers on the team “were inside the home during the attack and remained safe”.

No group immediately claimed responsibility for the attack in KP, which has long been a hive of militant activity.

President Zardari condemns Orakzai polio attack

President Asif Ali Zardari condemned the attack on the polio team, expressing sorrow over the martyrdom of the policemen.

Referring to the police response, his statement said: “The police officers fought bravely and sent three terrorists to hell.”

He reiterated the government’s resolve to continue efforts for a complete eradication of polio from the country.

Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi said in a statement: “The terrorists’ attack on the polio team is an attack on the safe future of Pakistan.”

Polio teams targeted

Pakistan has seen a surge in polio cases this year, recording 41 so far in 2024 compared with six in 2023.

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Polio vaccination teams, made up of health workers and police guards, have often come under attack in the restive and mountainous regions bordering Afghanistan.

Last month, dozens of policemen, who accompany medical teams during door-to-door campaigns, went on strike in the Bannu district after a string of militant attacks targeting them.

Prior to the strike, a police officer and a polio worker had been shot dead in Bajaur district’s Salarzai tehsil when unknown assailants attacked a polio vaccination team.

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Scores of polio vaccination workers and their escorts have been killed over the years. Since 2012, 126 persons have been killed and 201 injured in attacks targeting healthcare workers and officials of the polio programme, according to a Dawn report published last month.

In one of the most high-profile attacks, Dr Abdul Rehman, a polio programme official, was killed in Bajaur earlier this year.

Pockets of Pakistan’s border regions remain resistant to inoculation as a result of misinformation, conspiracy theories and some firebrand clerics declaring the jabs un-Islamic.

Opposition grew after the US Central Intelligence Agency organised a fake vaccination drive to help track down Al-Qaeda’s former leader Osama bin Laden in Pakistan.

Additional input from Nadir Guramani