ISLAMABAD: Militants rammed a vehicle packed with explosives into a security checkpoint in northwest Pakistan overnight, killing 15 people, including soldiers, police and government personnel, the military said on Friday.
“Fifteen brave sons of the soil, including twelve soldiers, two policemen and a government official in the former forest department, made the ultimate sacrifice and embraced Shahadat (martyrdom),” the army’s media wing said in a statement on the latest attack in the border province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (PK).
Security forces killed 12 militants during the attack, which took place in Tank district, according to the army.
“The attackers rammed a vehicle filled with explosives into the surrounding wall,” the statement said. “Due to the impact of the explosion, the infrastructure at the checkpoint was seriously damaged.”
No group immediately claimed responsibility for the attack, but the area has been gripped by an increasingly violent campaign by the Islamist militant group Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP).
Pakistan has previously blamed the increase in attacks in KP and the southern border province of Balochistan on militants originating from Afghanistan, where the Taliban government denies Afghan involvement.
The accusations have sparked a bitter rift and armed conflict between the neighboring countries, and Pakistan has carried out deadly airstrikes it says target militants on Afghan soil.
The Taliban government and the United Nations said dozens of civilians were killed in recent Pakistani attacks in eastern Afghanistan in June.
