PESHAWAR: Unidentified kidnappers on Thursday released two members of an anti-polio survey team, who were abducted earlier this week, in Pakistan’s northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) province, officials said. 

Around 10 gunmen initially captured four members of the team from the remote Umar Khan village in the Tank district on Tuesday, according to the police. 

They later released two members, Shaila Noor and Waheed Khan, and took the remaining two with them to remote mountains of the neighboring South Waziristan district, which had long been a stronghold of the Pakistani Taliban. 

On Thursday, the kidnappers released the hostages after talks with tribal elders, according to Tank District Police Officer (DPO) Iftikhar Ali Shah. 

“Tribal elders, supported by security forces and police, played a crucial role which led to the safe recovery of the kidnapped persons,” Shah told Arab News. 

The recovered anti-polio workers were identified as Zulfiqar and Muhammad Shuaib, according to the official. 

No group claimed responsibility for the abduction. 

Pakistan and Afghanistan are the only two countries in the world where polio remains endemic. 

But many Pakistanis are suspicious of foreign entities funding polio vaccination campaigns and of the government itself. The doubts and fears have led to attacks on polio teams and the law enforcers guarding them, especially in KP. 

On October 2, Pakistan launched a five-day national anti-polio campaign to inoculate 44 million children under the age of 5. 

Tahir Khan, who oversees the polio eradication campaign in the Tank region, said the abducted workers were part of the Lot Quality Assurance Sampling (LQAS) team, which had gone to the far-flung village to carry out a quality assessment exercise in the wake of the inoculation drive in the area. 

“Thank God, both were freed today and have reached their homes,” Khan told Arab News. “Because of consistent efforts of tribal elders, police, security officials and district administration, they were released unharmed.”