Two polio workers in Pakistan killed in a roadside bomb blast
A Pakistani police officer, left, stands guard while health worker Shahida Akram, 41, prepares polio vaccines to be given for children in a neighborhood in Islamabad, Pakistan, Wednesday, Jan. 30, 2013. Some Islamic militants oppose the vaccination campaign, accuse health workers of acting as spies for the U.S. and claim the polio vaccine is intended to make Muslim children sterile. Pakistan is one of the few remaining places where polio is still rampant. (AP /Muhammed Muheisen)
Two polio workers were killed in a bomb blast in the tribal regions of Pakistan. A total of nineteen polio workers have been killed in the region in the last two months.
The UPI reported:
Two workers administering polio vaccinations in the northwestern tribal regions of Pakistan have been killed by a roadside bomb, officials say.
Some 19 polio vaccination workers have now died in attacks in Pakistan in the last two months, Geo TV reported Thursday.
The men were killed by a roadside bomb as they visited a village in the upper Kurram tribal region, said Jawal Ali, the head of the campaign in that area.
No group claimed responsibility for the deaths, but the Taliban last year banned such vaccinations in Waziristan, terming the effort a cover for espionage.
Five female health workers involved in administering the polio vaccine were murdered in Pakistan in December.
