Abducted Pakistani police officials found with torture marks

Two Pakistani police officers who were allegedly kidnapped by activists of religious parties from a hospital were found lying alongside a road with marks of torture, fractured bones and bruises, the media reported on Tuesday.

Soon after a police patrol spotted them on Monday in Solan area, the two officers were taken back to Rawalpindi's District Headquarters Hospital, from where they were abducted, and admitted, the Dawn reported.

According to a doctor, the policemen had sustained internal injuries too.

Sub-Inspector Aslam Hayat's left elbow was fractured and both he and his colleague Amanat Ali had been beaten with plastic coated wire, sticks and batons and had bruises on their bodies, the daily said.

The policemen were abducted from the hospital during Saturday's clashes between security forces and Islamists on a highway linking Rawalpindi and Islamabad.

"Both Hayat and Ali were ruthlessly tortured by the kidnappers and were detained in a makeshift tent in Faizabad after they were kidnapped," an unnamed Deputy Superintendent of Police was quoted as saying.

A group of religious protesters had entered the hospital mortuary and got into a row with one of the police officers after he refused to write what the protesters wanted him to write.

They started beating him, dragged him out, beat him again, put him in a car and drove off, the Dawn said.

They came back for the other official, beat him too and took him from the mortuary as well. A police constable accompanying the two officials escaped, the daily said.

The Saturday violence left seven people dead and several injured.

--IANS

mr/soni