Chinese President Hu Jintao has urged Pakistan to track down the gunmen who killed three Chinese engineers in a drive-by shooting, Xinhua news agency said yesterday. The attack occurred near the southern town of Hub, outside Karachi, ahead of a planned visit to China by Pakistani President Perves Musharraf on Sunday.

A spokesman for the Baluch Liberation Army claimed responsibility, warning against outsiders seeking to exploit the southwestern province of Baluchistan?s mineral resources. ?Informed about the murder Wednesday evening, Hu Jintao ordered (the) Chinese Foreign Ministry, embassy and consulates to require Pakistan to catch the murderers, ensure the safety of the Chinese there and properly handle the aftermath,? Xinhua said. Two of the workers were killed on the spot and third died later from his wounds.

The Chinese Ministry of Commerce named the three as Long Hongbao, Wei Jianpin and Zhao Bin, who were helping to build a cement factory, Xinhua added. The bodies were taken to Karachi yesterday and would be flown back to China by chartered plane in a few days, it said.

Musharraf and Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz offered condolences to the men?s families and condemned the killings as an act of terrorism, the Associated Press of Pakistan said. They gave assurances that the government would make every effort to catch the killers, it added. A foreign ministry statement quoted spokeswoman Tasnim Aslam as saying that the killings were aimed at driving a wedge between Pakistan and China. Security for Chinese workers in Pakistan would be increased, she said.

China is a traditional ally of Pakistan, one of Islamabad?s main suppliers of arms, and has also provided hundreds of millions of dollars in development finance. Separatists and tribal militants are fighting the Pakistan army in Baluchistan, a sparsely populated but mineral-rich region, which is the main source of gas for the country.

Chinese workers have been targeted in the past, as Chinese firms are heavily involved in infrastructure projects in the province. A bomb in the Baluch port of Gwadar killed three Chinese engineers and wounded nine in May 2004.

In October 2004, two Chinese workers were kidnapped in South Waziristan, a tribal region bordering Afghanistan, and one was later killed when security forces mounted a rescue. The kidnapping was blamed on al Qaeda linked militants rather than Baluch rebels.