The Pakistani Taliban on Saturday claimed responsibility for deadly attacks in several northwestern districts that killed 20 security officials and three civilians.<\/p>\n
The attacks, which included a suicide bombing on a police training school, were carried out on Friday in several districts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province that borders Afghanistan.<\/p>\n
Militancy has surged in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa since the withdrawal of US-led troops from neighbouring Afghanistan in 2021 and the return of the Taliban government in Kabul.<\/p>\n
Eleven paramilitary troops were killed in the border Khyber district, while seven policemen were killed after a suicide bomber rammed an explosives-laden car into the gate of a police training school in Dera Ismail Khan district, which was followed by a gun attack.<\/p>\n
“Seven police personnel were martyred and 13 were injured in the attack, while six terrorists were also killed,” Muhammad Hussain, a senior local police official, told AFP.<\/p>\n
Five people, including three civilians, were killed in a separate clash between militants and paramilitary troops in Bajaur district, security officials told AFP on Saturday.<\/p>\n
The Pakistani Taliban, the Tehreek-e-Taliban (TTP), claimed responsibility for the attacks in messages on social media. The group is separate to but closely linked with the Afghan Taliban.<\/p>\n
The attacks came hours after Afghanistan’s Taliban government accused Pakistan of “violating Kabul’s sovereign territory”, a day after two explosions were heard in the capital.<\/p>\n
Pakistan did not say if it was behind the blasts in Kabul but said it had the right to defend itself against surging border militancy.<\/p>\n
Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif “strongly condemns” Friday’s attacks, his office said in a statement.<\/p>\n
“Such cowardly acts by terrorists cannot shake our resolve against terrorism,” the statement said. “We are determined to completely eliminate terrorism from the country.”<\/p>\n
– ‘Enough is enough’ –<\/p>\n
Islamabad accuses Afghanistan of failing to expel militants using Afghan territory to launch attacks on Pakistan, an accusation that authorities in Kabul deny.<\/p>\n
The TTP and its affiliates are behind most of the violence — largely directed at security forces.<\/p>\n
Including Friday’s attacks at least 32 Pakistani troops and three civilians have been killed this week alone in the border regions, while dozens of militants were also killed.<\/p>\n
More than 500 people, including 311 troops and 73 policemen, have been killed in attacks since January up to September 15, a military spokesman said on Friday.<\/p>\n
Earlier this year, a UN report said the TTP “receive substantial logistical and operational support from the de facto authorities”, referring to the Taliban government in Kabul.<\/p>\n
Pakistani Defence Minister Khawaja Muhammad Asif told parliament on Thursday that several efforts to convince the Afghan Taliban to stop backing the TTP had failed.<\/p>\n
“We will not tolerate this any longer,” Asif said. “United, we must respond to those facilitating them, whether the hideouts are on our soil or Afghan soil.”<\/p>\n
He warned that any response could cause collateral damage. “Everyone will have to bear the consequences, including those providing the hideouts,” he said.<\/p>\n
“Enough is enough,” he added. “The Pakistani government and army’s patience has run out.”<\/p>\n
la-zz\/mtp<\/p>\n
\u00a9 Agence France-Presse<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Pakistani Taliban on Saturday claimed responsibility for deadly attacks in several northwestern districts that killed 20 security officials and three civilians. The attacks, which included a suicide bombing on a police training school, were carried out on Friday in several districts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province that borders Afghanistan. Militancy has surged in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":13594,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sitemap_exclude":false,"_sitemap_priority":"","_sitemap_frequency":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":{"subtitle":"","format":"standard","override":[{"template":"7","parallax":"1","fullscreen":"1","layout":"left-sidebar","sidebar":"default-sidebar","second_sidebar":"default-sidebar","sticky_sidebar":"1","share_position":"topbottom","share_float_style":"share-monocrhome","show_share_counter":"1","show_view_counter":"1","show_featured":"1","show_post_meta":"1","show_post_author":"1","show_post_author_image":"1","show_post_date":"1","post_date_format":"default","post_date_format_custom":"Y\/m\/d","show_post_category":"1","show_post_reading_time":"0","post_reading_time_wpm":"300","post_calculate_word_method":"str_word_count","show_zoom_button":"0","zoom_button_out_step":"2","zoom_button_in_step":"3","show_post_tag":"1","show_prev_next_post":"1","show_popup_post":"1","show_comment_section":"1","number_popup_post":"1","show_author_box":"1","show_post_related":"0","show_inline_post_related":"0"}],"image_override":[{"single_post_thumbnail_size":"crop-500","single_post_gallery_size":"crop-500"}],"trending_post_position":"meta","trending_post_label":"Trending","sponsored_post_label":"Sponsored by","disable_ad":"0"},"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":{"view_counter_number":"0","share_counter_number":"0","like_counter_number":"0","dislike_counter_number":"0"},"jnews_post_split":{"post_split":[{"template":"1","tag":"h2","numbering":"asc","mode":"normal","first":"0","enable_toc":"0","toc_type":"normal"}]},"footnotes":""},"categories":[79],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13592","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-regional"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.iq\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13592","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.iq\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.iq\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.iq\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.iq\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13592"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/news.iq\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13592\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.iq\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13594"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.iq\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13592"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.iq\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13592"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.iq\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13592"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}