Balkh police arrest 10-member robbers gang

MAZAR-I-SHARIF (Pajhwok): Security officials in northern Balkh province have arrested a 10-member group accused of murdering six people, robberies and selling alcohol in Mazar-i-Sharif, the provincial capital.

Police spokesman Mohammad Asif Waziri said the crime branch had arrested ten people involved in armed robberies, kidnappings and drug trafficking in Mazar-i-Sharif city.

Waziri said the men were arrested within five days, and a number of weapons, ammunition, drugs and cars were recovered from them.

Balkh crime branch police chief Maulvi Mohammad Umar Bilal, says: "The group includes two persons who intoxicated a number of people with soft drinks and dried fruits in different areas of Mazar-i-Sharif and looted them.  Six of the intoxicated people who were weak have died.”

The victims of these incidents say they were intoxicated and their money, mobile phones and other valuable were taken away.

Haji Gul Mohammad, a resident of Laila desert area of ​​Shiberghan, who came to Mazar-i-Sharif to buy livestock, was first intoxicated and then robbed of a sheep, two mobile phones and other items.

He says: "I bought a sheep in the cattle market. I wanted to go to Shiberghan, the capital of Jawzjan province, my hometown, when some individuals intoxicated me near the cattle market, and after a few days, I regained consciousness in the Mazar-i-Sharif hospital.”

He said he was deprived of a sheep, two mobile phones, a battery and other valuables and dumped him in Chaharbulak district.

Another victim, Najibullah, who works as a money changer in Mazar-i-Sharif city, says that two of the arrested people intoxicated him inside his car while leaving the money changer's market and stole a mobile phone in addition to 451,000 afghanis. .

The affected people requested the government  to severely punish the arrested people and recover their belongings.

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