Peshawar:
Terrorists have begun to use commercially acquired quadcopter drones to drop bombs on security forces in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, police said, a potentially dangerous development in the unstable province.
The use of such drones, driven by four rotors that allow for vertical start and landing, is to worry about the overstretched and under -equipped police force, the front line against terrorist attacks, officials said.
Two quadcopters sent by the terrorists targeted a police station earlier this month, killed a woman and injured three children in a nearby house in the Bannu district, police officer Muhammad Anwar said.
A drone discovered over another police station was shot down with assault rifles, he said. It was armed with a mortar, he said. At least eight such drone attacks have targeted police and security forces in Bannu and adjacent areas in the last two and a half months, he said.
Regional Police Chief Sajjad Khan said terrorists were still trying to master the use of the drones. “The terrorists have acquired these modern tools, but they are in the process of experimentation, which is why they cannot hit their goals exactly,” he added.
They use Quadcopters to drop improvised explosion devices or mortar shells on their goals, five security officials said. They said these explosive devices were filled with ball bearings or iron pieces.
KP IG Zulfiqar Hameed said police lacked resources to meet the new challenge. “We don’t have equipment to counter the drones,” he told a local news channel on Sunday. “The terrorists are better equipped than we are,” he said.
