ISLAMABAD: The army said on Monday a suicide bomber had targeted a security forces convoy, killing two civilians and injuring seven civilians and three soldiers in northwest Pakistan.

The military said the bomber was affiliated with a militant group headed by militant commander Hafiz Gul Bahadur, who used to operate in Pakistan's North Waziristan border region. The faction is allied with the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), which carries out a majority of terror attacks in Pakistan. The army added that the bomber had been identified as an Afghan national, without giving evidence, and had struck in the Bakka Khel area in Bannu District.

“Resultantly, 2x innocent civilians embraced Shahadat, while 7x civilians and 3x soldiers got injured,” the military said. “Sanitization operation is being carried out to eliminate any other terrorists found in the area.”

The TTP, or Pakistani Taliban, are a separate group but allies of the Afghan Taliban, who seized power in Afghanistan in 2021 as the US and NATO troops were in the final stages of their pullout. Kabul denies it allows militants to harbor on its soil.

Islamabad last month announced it would expel over a million undocumented migrants, mostly Afghans, amid a row with Kabul over charges that it harbors anti-Pakistan militants. Since the announcement of the deportation drive on Oct. 3, Pakistani officials have variously said Afghan nationals have been found to be involved in a majority of recent terror attacks in the country,

On Nov. 8, Prime Minister Anwaar-ul-Haq Kakar said in an unusually harshly worded presser that the move to expel undocumented Afghans was a response to the unwillingness of the Taliban-led administration to act against militants using Afghanistan to carry out attacks in Pakistan.

"After non-cooperation by the Afghan interim government, Pakistan has decided to take matters into its own hands - and Pakistan's recent actions are neither unexpected or surprising," caretaker Prime Minister Anwar ul Haq Kakar told journalists.

Tens of thousands of Afghans, many of whom have lived in Pakistan for decades, have had to leave the country, and authorities are rounding up many more in raids across the country.