ISLAMABAD: Four militants and three paramilitary personnel were killed in separate incidents in Pakistan's northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) province, authorities said on Monday, amid a surge in militancy in the region bordering Afghanistan.
Security forces conducted an intelligence-based operation in KP's Dera Ismail Khan district on reports about militant presence, according to the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR), the military's media wing.
An intense exchange of fire followed between the two sides and four Pakistani Taliban militants were killed during the operation.
“Weapons and ammunition were also recovered from Indian sponsored killed Khwarij (Pakistani Taliban militants), who remained actively involved in numerous terrorist activities in the area,” the ISPR said.
“Sanitization operation is being conducted to eliminate any other Indian-sponsored kharji found in the area.”
New Delhi did not immediately respond to the Pakistani military's statement.
In the second incident, militants gunned down three personnel of the Federal Constabulary (FC) paramilitary force after a quadcopter attack on an FC camp in KP's Karak district, a police official said on Monday.
The explosive-laden quadcopter struck the FC camp in the Bahadur Khel area early Monday morning and injured seven FC troops, according to Karak police spokesperson Shaukat Khan.
Three FC personnel were killed when militants attacked a Rescue 1122 ambulance which was transporting the injured troops to a hospital following the attack.
“With this incident, the total number of FC personnel martyred has risen to three, while five others, including a member of the rescue team, were injured,” Khan told Arab News.
“A search operation is currently underway to trace those responsible.”
No group immediately claimed responsibility for the attack, but Pakistani officials have said in the past that armed groups, particularly the Pakistani Taliban, have been increasingly using commercial drones modified to drop explosives, alongside other weapons they say were acquired after the US military withdrawal from neighboring Afghanistan.
Pakistan is witnessing a surge in militancy in its northwestern KP and southwestern Balochistan provinces that border Afghanistan. Islamabad accuses Afghanistan of allowing the use of its soil and India of backing militant groups for cross-border attacks against Pakistan. Kabul and New Delhi deny this.
On Sunday, Pakistani security forces killed five militants, including a suicide bomber, during an intelligence-based operation in the country’s southwestern Balochistan province, the military’s media wing said. The operation took place in Balochistan’s Pishin district after security forces received reports about the presence of Pakistani Taliban militants.
The Pakistani Taliban, or the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), have carried out some of the deadliest attacks against civilians and law enforcement agencies in Pakistan since 2007 in their bid to impose their own brand of Islamic law in the country.
Pakistan also carried out intelligence-based strikes on alleged militant camps and hideouts in Afghanistan’s Nangarhar, Paktika and Khost provinces on Saturday, a security official said. The official said more than 80 militants were killed in the attacks, a claim denied by the Afghan Taliban who said Islamabad killed and wounded dozens of civilians in the strikes.
The strikes have increased tensions between the neighbors, with Afghanistan warning it will retaliate at a “suitable time.”
