QUETTA, Sept 28: Three security personnel were killed and four others injured in an ambush on a survey team of an oil company by some unknown armed men in Shahrag area, some 300 kilometres east of here, on Wednesday.

The outlawed Baloch Liberation Army (BLA) claimed responsibility for the attack.

A Pakistani company, Marri Gas, in collaboration with Chinese company Bureau of Geo-Physical Perceptive (BGP), has been engaged in oil and gas exploration in Hazaradum area of Harnai district for the last two years. Sources said when the survey team of Marri Gas and Chinese company reached Shahrag area, the armed men, sitting in trenches, opened indiscriminate fire, killing one security guard of the company on the spot and injuring six others. Later, two more security guards died in hospital.

Security personnel and FC men guarding the survey team returned fire, leading to a firefight lasting half an hour.

“Three security guards of the company were killed in the armed attack,” Deputy Commissioner of Harnai Khuda-i-Nazar Baraich told , adding that the injured included two FC personnel. He said security forces had cordoned off the entire area and launched a search operation.

The three security guards killed in the attack were identified as Jamil Hussain, Ejaz Ahmed and Shahbaz Ali. The injured were Taj Ali Khattak, Hussain Khattak, Zeeshan and Mohammad Hanif.

After the incident, authorities sent more security personnel to the area to ensure security of workers.

A BLA spokesman told media by telephone from an unknown place that four people had been killed in the attack.—Saleem Shahid