DERA ISLAMAIL KHAN, Pakistan (AP) — Pakistani security forces raided a militant hideout, killing 11 people in a night raid on a former Pakistani Taliban stronghold in the busy Northwest, authorities said Tuesday.
The intelligence-based attack was in retaliation for Sunday’s roadside bombing that killed seven soldiers in the same district of Lakki Marwat in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa on the border with Afghanistan, the military said in a statement.
He added that the operation is still ongoing “to eliminate any other terrorists found in the area” and that security forces are “determined to end the threat of terrorism” in Pakistan.
No one has claimed responsibility for Sunday’s attack, however, the blame will likely fall on the Pakistani Taliban, known as Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan or TTP, an ally of the Afghan Taliban but is a separate group. It has intensified its attacks in the region since Taliban took power in Afghanistan in 2021.
Pakistani authorities frequently accuse Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers of harboring TTP fighters, an accusation Kabul has repeatedly denied. The Pakistani Taliban say they are not using Afghan soil for attacks in Pakistan.
