QUETTA: Gunmen stormed Jewani airport on Sunday, killing two engineers and destroying the facility’s radar system, authorities said.
The airport is in Balochistan’s Gwadar District, home to a strategic port of the same name that is key to a planned $46 billion China-Pakistan Economic Corridor linking the port to China’s far-western Xinjiang district.
About a dozen terrorists on motorcycles were involved in the attack, said a provincial government spokesman.
“They entered the control room at about 3:30am and set it on fire,” said a senior police official. He said one man was killed, one wounded and a third engineer was abducted.
The body of the abducted engineer was later found in nearby mountains, police said.
Flights have not been running to Jewani airport since Pakistan International Airlines, the state carrier, suspended service several years ago.
However, civil aviation workers continued to use airport’s radar and navigational systems to aid aircraft flying over the area.
A Civil Aviation Authority official said that back-up systems already in place meant there was no disruption to international air traffic. The banned terrorist outfit Baloch Liberation Army (BLA) has claimed responsibility for the attack.