Karachi court jails man 48 years for attack on Chinese engineers

A Karachi anti-terrorism court has sentenced Dad Bux to prison terms totalling 48 years for a 2021 gun attack on a car carrying two Chinese engineers, ordering the terms to run concurrently, which leaves him serving a single 14-year term.

Judge Ameenuddin Khaskheli of Anti-Terrorism Court No. IV convicted Bux on seven counts, including terrorism, attempted murder and illegal possession of a firearm, Arab News reported after seeing the judgment. Dawn reported the sentence as 48 years.

The shooting took place on July 28, 2021, near Gulbai Bridge, as the engineers travelled from Defence to the SITE industrial area to install machinery at a factory. A gunman riding pillion on a motorcycle opened fire on the vehicle and fled. One engineer, identified in the judgment as Yuan Changfeng, was hit in several parts of his body. His Chinese colleague and their Pakistani driver were unhurt.

The court handed down 14 years for terrorism, 10 years each for attempted murder and illegal possession of a firearm, seven years and three years on separate counts of causing firearm injuries, and two years each for causing injury and damaging a vehicle. It fined Bux a total of Rs1.35 million, about $4,800, and ordered compensation for the injured engineer. He was already in judicial custody and will serve the term at Karachi Central Prison. He may appeal to the Sindh High Court.

Arab News reported that a rickshaw driver who saw the attack identified Bux at a judicial identification parade and later before the trial court, and that forensic examination linked cartridge cases from the scene to a 9mm pistol recovered during the investigation.

The banned Balochistan Liberation Front claimed responsibility for the shooting, according to a statement investigators presented in court. Arab News reported that the court held the claim alone was not enough to establish that Bux belonged to the group. Dawn described him as a BLF member.

Authorities have also accused Bux of facilitating the April 2022 suicide bombing at the Confucius Institute of the University of Karachi, which killed three Chinese teachers and their Pakistani driver. Investigators alleged he surveyed Chinese nationals before that attack, which the banned Balochistan Liberation Army claimed. He was charged in that case, but the conviction reported on Friday concerned only the 2021 shooting.

Pakistan has faced sustained pressure from China to improve security for Chinese nationals working on infrastructure and energy projects, many of them under the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor. In March 2024 five Chinese engineers and their Pakistani driver were killed in a suicide bombing in Bisham, in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.