Four people killed in targeted killings in Karachi

Islamabad: Four people, including a paramilitary soldier, were killed on Thursday in Karachi, reports have said.

The targeted killings raise to 13 the number of deaths in drive-by assaults in two days in Pakistan’s biggest city, reports said.

Karachi, the capital of southern Sindh province, has been in the grip of a renewed wave of killings during the month of May, with incidents reported almost daily from different parts of the port city of around 20 million people.

More than 35 people were killed and many more injured in fierce gun battles during a police operation in the city’s oldest neighbourhood of Lyari in early May.

The police operation was halted midway without having achieved the stated aim of rooting out alleged criminal elements.

During the incidents on Thursday, a member of the paramilitary Rangers was gunned down outside his home by men on motorbikes in the Korangi area.

Another man was shot dead in the Mairpur area while another two people were killed in the Lea Market locality.

On Wednesday, nine people were killed in different areas of Karachi.

Provincial authorities have so far been unable to put an end to the prolonged cycle of violence.

The Sindh ruling coalition, led by the Pakistan People’s Party and including the Muttahida Qaumi Movement and the Awami National Party, has been widely criticised for failing to maintain law and order in the country’s economic hub.