22 February 2016•Update: 25 February 2016
By Aamir Latif
KARACHI, Pakistan
Eight suspected Taliban militants were killed on Monday in an hours-long gunfight with police in Pakistan’s southern port city of Karachi, local officials have said.
After launching an operation based on a tipoff that the militants were hiding out in the eastern town of Malir, police had engaged the suspects in a four-hour firefight, local police official Rao Anwar told reporters.
According to Rao, the slain militants had belonged to the outlawed Lashkar-e-Jhangvi, a hardline Sunni militant group, and the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, a consortium of various Pakistan-based insurgent groups.
Several militants who had managed to flee the scene were now being pursued by police, Rao said.
Over the course of the last year alone, some 250 suspected militants have been killed in Karachi in clashes with Pakistani security forces.
During the same period, roughly two dozen security personnel lost their lives in clashes with militants.
Pakistan’s commercial capital, Karachi is known for frequent gang wars and sectarian violence.
Many of the city’s suburban localities are considered safe havens for Taliban militants fleeing the restive North Waziristan region, where the Pakistani military is waging an anti-insurgency campaign.
