Photo credit: AP News
The death toll from an overnight deadly militant attack on a police post in northwestern Pakistan rose to 11 early Thursday, police and a government official said.
The Associated Press reports that security forces killed 15 militants in an hour-long gun battle after they targeted the Khazina police post in Hangu district in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, which borders Afghanistan, police official Irfan.
No group immediately claimed responsibility for the assault. Suspicion is likely to fall on the Pakistani Taliban or TTP, which has stepped up attacks on Pakistani security forces in the region in recent months.
Police said the militants attacked the police post with heavy weapons. Reinforcements dispatched to the scene were ambushed en route, damaging an armoured personnel carrier before officers fought back, according to the statements.
Pakistan has witnessed a surge in militant attacks in recent years, much of it blamed on the TTP, a separate group but a close ally of the Afghan Taliban, who returned to power in neighbouring Afghanistan in 2021. Islamabad has repeatedly accused Afghanistan’s Taliban government of providing sanctuary to TTP militants, an allegation Kabul denies.
