COTABATO CITY — Two foreign moneylenders were killed in separate gun attacks in Central Mindanao in two days, barely two weeks after an Indian national collecting loan payments perished in an ambush in the region.
Pakistani moneylender Arshad Taraz Khan was shot dead at about dusk on Saturday by a lone attacker while transacting with clients in Barangay Salaman in Lebak town in Sultan Kudarat province in Region 12.
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Lt. Col. Julius Malcontento, chief of the Lebak municipal police, told reporters on Monday that they found two spent .45 caliber shells at the spot where Khan was gunned down.
“We are still trying to identify his killer with the help of barangay officials,” Malcontento said.
On Sunday, two men armed with pistols killed Indian moneylender Jaspreet Singh in a stretch of a highway in Barangay Damalusay in Datu Paglas town in Maguindanao del Sur in the Bangsamoro region.
Maguindanao del Sur and Sultan Kudarat are adjoining provinces in central Mindanao.
The Maguindanao del Sur Provincial Police Office, in a report to Bangsamoro regional police director Brig. Gen. Allan Nobleza, said that the victim was riding his motorcycle when his attackers flagged him down and opened fire as he got close killing him instantly.
Nobleza said he has directed the Datu Paglas Municipal Police Station and the Maguindanao del Sur PPO to cooperate in identifying the killers of Singh.
He was killed just two weeks after gunmen killed his compatriot, the moneylender Laxman Singh, in a daytime ambush at a busy stretch of a highway in Buluan, capital town of Maguindanao del Sur, not too distant from the capitol of the province.
The ambushers took the sling bag of the slain Indian national containing his cash collection before they scampered away.