At least 14 people — including 11 security personnel — were killed in two bomb attacks and a gunfight in northwest Pakistan, authorities said, underscoring a surge in militant violence in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province along the Afghan border. At least 25 others were wounded across the separate incidents.
A security official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said a suicide bomber in the evening rammed an explosives-laden vehicle into the wall of a religious college in Bajaur district. “The blast also caused the roofs of several nearby houses to collapse, killing a child,” the official said, adding that the death toll could rise as rescue teams combed the rubble.
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In a second incident in the town of Bannu, a bomb planted in a rickshaw detonated at the Miryan police station, killing two civilians and injuring 17 people, according to the same security official. Local footage showed relatives carrying the wounded through busy hospital corridors as medics treated blast victims.
Elsewhere in the province, three police personnel and three militants were killed during a search operation in Shangla district, the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa police force said in a statement. The force added that the militants slain in the firefight had been involved in “attacks targeting Chinese nationals.”
China has poured billions of dollars into Pakistan in recent years, largely through infrastructure and energy schemes tied to the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor. But such projects have also fueled local resentment, and Chinese citizens have repeatedly been targeted. In March last year, five Chinese nationals working on a major dam and their Pakistani driver were killed when a suicide bomber struck their vehicle on the mountainous Karakoram Highway.
The latest bloodshed comes as Pakistan’s security forces grapple with intensifying insurgencies in the country’s north and south. Earlier this month, the Islamic State group claimed responsibility for a massive suicide blast at a Shiite mosque in the capital, Islamabad, that killed at least 31 people and wounded 169, further straining security resources.
Authorities said investigations into the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa attacks were underway and warned that casualty figures could increase as more information emerges from remote districts and hospital reports.
By Abdiwahab Ahmed
Axadle Times international–Monitoring.
