Militants attack a security post in northwest Pakistan, killing ten officers

PESHAWAR, Pakistan (AP) — Militants armed with assault rifles and grenades attacked a security post in northwestern Pakistan, killing 10 officers in a fierce shootout, police said Friday.

Three other security force members were injured in the overnight attack in Dera Ismail Khan, a district in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, local police officer Abdul Rauf said.

He said the attackers suffered casualties and fled along with their dead and injured accomplices as authorities sent reinforcements to the security post in the town of Draban.

Ali Amin Gandapur, the chief minister of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, paid tribute to the slain officers in a statement and expressed his condolences to their families.

Also on Friday, suspected militants ambushed a police vehicle carrying officers, killing a local police chief and another police officer, authorities said.

No one claimed responsibility for either attack, but suspicion is likely to fall on the Pakistani Taliban, who frequently attack security forces across the country, particularly in former tribal areas in the restive northwest.

In a statement, the Interior Ministry condemned the killing of security forces in the northwest.

Security forces recently conducted intelligence-based operations against the Pakistani Taliban, known as Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, which have been emboldened since the Afghan Taliban came to power in Afghanistan in 2021.

The TTP is a separate group but a close ally of the Afghan Taliban.

The attack on the security post came within 24 hours of two separate operations in which security forces shot dead 19 insurgents in Bajur, a district in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, and Mianwali, a city in eastern Punjab province.

The Associated Press