4 killed in attack on NGO office
Bureau Report

PESHAWAR—Gunmen opened fire and hurled grenades Monday at the office of a British-run aid group in northwest Pakistan, killing at least four local staff and wounding 10 others, officials said. The attackers stormed the office of Plan International, a non-governmental organisation, in the northwestern town of Mansehra and fled after setting the premises ablaze, they said.
“We have collected four bodies. There are 10 injured, it’s an emergency situation — we are trying to confirm more details,” Mohammad Ashfaq, local coordinator for Plan International, told by telephone from Mansehra. Local hospital doctor Rizwan Shah confirmed that two dead bodies had been brought in, while two people died in hospital.
“Of the first two people, there was a woman who had probably died due to an explosion, but her body had been badly charred, while the man who died had bullet wounds,” Shah said. Police said the gunmen came in two cars and fled after the attack on the offices of the organisation, which he said had been active in the area for the past 12 years in the fields of education, health and development.
“We have sent search parties after the attackers and called in the fire brigade,” local police official Zulfiqar Jadoon told. Ashfaq said that the organisation had not received any threats. Plan International is based in Woking in southern England. It was founded more than 70 years ago and is one of the oldest and largest international development agencies in the world, according to its website.
Pro-Taliban militants have bombed the offices of NGOs in the past in Pakistan, alleging that foreign-funded groups are trying to undermine their version of strict Islamic law which bars women from working. Dozens of local and foreign aid organisations have been working in the area since October 2005 when a massive earthquake killed more than 73,000 people in impoverished North West Frontier Province and Pakistani Kashmir.