Pakistani authorities said Saturday a suicide truck bomb and gun attack on a regional army base near the Afghan border killed at least seven soldiers, including two officers, and wounded many more.
The early morning raid occurred in the volatile North Waziristan border district, where militants linked to the banned Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, or TTP, routinely target security forces.
Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif condemned the raid as a “cowardly action of terrorists,” his office said.
A military statement said that a group of six militants, including suicide bombers, assaulted the base in the town of Mir Ali.
“The terrorists rammed an explosive-laden vehicle into the post, followed by multiple suicide bombing attacks, which led to the collapse of a portion of a building,” the statement added. It said that Pakistani troops had quickly engaged and killed all the assailants in the ensuing “intense exchange of fire.”
According to area security and hospital sources, the violence injured more than 17 soldiers. The army said its forces had launched a “sanitization operation to eliminate any other terrorist present in the area.”
A militant group allied with TTP reportedly claimed responsibility for the attack.
Pakistan’s military and government officials say TTP and its allies use Afghan sanctuaries to stage cross-border attacks on security forces and civilians.
Pakistan has experienced a dramatic increase in TTP-led militant attacks since the Taliban returned to power in neighboring Afghanistan in August 2021. The violence has killed about 2,000 Pakistanis, including police and military personnel.
Taliban authorities deny they allow Afghan soil to be used by militant groups, including TTP, a globally designated terrorist organization. Pakistani officials and recent United Nations reports dispute the Taliban claims.
“In the region and beyond, there are well-founded concerns over the presence of terrorist groups in Afghanistan,” Roza Otunbayeva, the head of the U.N. Assistance Mission in Afghanistan, told a March 6 U.N. Security Council meeting.
“These concerns have been reflected in the reports of the sanctions monitoring teams. It is not only Daesh that constitutes a threat but also TTP, a major concern for Pakistan, which has seen an increase in terrorist activity,” Otunbayeva said.
Daesh is an acronym for the Islamic State, and this militant group is an Afghanistan-based regional IS affiliate that conducts terrorist attacks on both sides of the long border between the two countries.
