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Umpire Ahsan Raza wants to move past 'dreadful' 2009 attack

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ANI Karachi

Umpire Ahsan Raza has said he wants to forget the horrific 2009 terror attack, where he was shot at twice.

Raza, 40, who's looking forward to umpiring Pakistan's match against Zimbabwe, said it was hard to recover from the incident, which led to him receiving stitches around his stomach and a bullet damaging his right lung, the Dawn reports.

The ambush of a bus carrying the Sri Lankan cricket team six years ago while it was headed towards Lahore's Gaddafi Stadium, claimed the lives of six police officers, and closed the door on international cricket being played in Pakistan.

However, with Zimbabwe agreeing to tour, the country will step back into international cricket limelight again on Friday with the first Twenty20 game.

 

Raza, who'll officiate as an onfield umpire in the two Twenty20s and in one of the three One-Day Internationals, said he was proud to be a part of the series and creditted the PCB for convincing Zimbabwe to undertake the tour.

The nation has vowed to offer "foolproof" security to the Zimbabwe team, and has assigned armed personnel travelling in a fleet of vans surrounding the team bus during the travel from the hotel to the stadium, with at least 4,000 policemen allotted to guard the visitors.

Gaddafi Stadium will host all five matches with hundreds of policemen on duty around the 27,000-capacity stadium.

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First Published: May 21 2015 | 3:07 PM IST

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