At least 15 people, including 12 soldiers, two police and a government officer, have been killed after militants rammed an explosives-laden vehicle into a security checkpoint in Pakistan’s northwest Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, the country’s military said Friday.
The attack took place overnight in Tank district, where militants drove the vehicle into the perimeter wall of a security check post, and there were casualties in the blast.
According to the military’s media wing, the dead included 12 soldiers, two police and one forest department official. Security personnel who were “embracing martyrdom and defending the country,” said the military.
The military said security forces responded to the attack and killed 12 militants during the operation.
No militant group immediately claimed responsibility for the attack. But the incident comes at a time of increasing militant violence across Pakistan, particularly in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
Much of the violence in the province has been attributed to the banned Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), which has intensified attacks in the region in recent years.
Pakistan has repeatedly accused militants in neighbouring Afghanistan of carrying out attacks in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan. The Taliban-controlled government in Afghanistan has rejected the allegations, but the dispute has inflamed relations between the two countries.
The deteriorating security situation has also led Pakistan to conduct airstrikes against what it says are militant hideouts in Afghanistan. Pakistan has said in recent weeks that Pakistani strikes in eastern Afghanistan killed 55 civilians.
10 Militants Killed in Balochistan Operations
The latest attack in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa comes just as Pakistani security forces are carrying on fighting militants in other parts of the country.
On July 22, 10 militants were killed and two female suicide bombers were arrested during security operations in Balochistan, military media wing said.
Seven militants were killed in Surab district and three others were killed in Mastung district. Security forces also arrested two female suicide bombers and their alleged facilitator in Mastung District.
The military said the operations are part of an ongoing campaign against militant groups in the province. During a series of intelligence-based raids and sanitisation operations in the area, security forces went to suspected militants’ hideouts and recovered weapons, ammunition and improvised explosive devices.
This comes at a time of high security risk in Balochistan. Security forces and law enforcement agencies launched Operation Shaban after an attack on a police station at Mangi Dam pumping station in Ziarat on July 6 killed 27 police.
This violence is indicative of a continuing security issue in Pakistan, and the scale of attacks and counterterrorism in both Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan is growing.
