World News | Four Members of Anti-polio Team Abducted in Northwest Pakistan; 2 Released Later
Get latest articles and stories on World at LatestLY. Four members of a polio vaccination team were allegedly abducted in Pakistan by unknown abductors in the country's restive Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, two of whom were later released, police said on Tuesday.
Peshawar, Oct 17 (PTI) Four members of a polio vaccination team were allegedly abducted in Pakistan by unknown abductors in the country's restive Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, two of whom were later released, police said on Tuesday.
The incident occurred in the Kari Umer Khan village of the Tank district, according to District Police Officer (DPO) Iftikhar Ali.
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Kidnappers abducted four members of the team, including a female worker, during an oral vaccination drive that was underway amid tight security in the district.
The team, along with the driver, was lifted, and the official vehicle shifted to an undisclosed location, the DPO said.
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The kidnappers later released the female polio vaccinator and the driver during an operation conducted by the police team, he told PTI.
While the other two male vaccinators were still in the abductors' custody, police teams were raiding suspected hideouts in the district for their recovery, he added.
Incidents of attacks on polio teams in the southern districts of the province have claimed scores of lives, including those of polio workers and policemen escorting the vaccinators in the recent past.
Pakistan is one of two countries where polio still remains endemic, according to the World Health Organisation.
Three environmental samples collected from cities in Punjab, Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa provinces were found positive for poliovirus, the Dawn newspaper reported last week, quoting sources from Pakistan's National Polio Laboratory at the National Institute of Health (NIH).
(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)