Two suicide bombers yesterday attacked the headquarters of a security force in northwestern Pakistan, killing at least three officers and wounding 11 others, police and rescue officials said.
The attack took place in Peshawar, the capital of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province bordering Afghanistan, when security forces were preparing for the morning parade at the sprawling facility in the heart of the city, Peshawar Police Chief Saeed Ahmad said.
He said one attacker detonated his explosives at the main gate of the provincial headquarters of the Federal Constabulary, while the second bomber was shot and killed by officers near the parking area.
Photo: EPA
About 150 security personnel were on open ground inside the headquarters for morning parade drills when the attack took place, Ahmad said.
“The terrorists involved in today’s attack were on foot and failed to reach the parade area, and a timely response by our forces prevented a much larger tragedy,” he said.
Police had completed the clearance operation and authorities had collected samples of the body parts of the attackers for DNA tests, he said, adding that police were still investigating to determine the identity and nationality of the attackers without giving further details.
Asim Khan, a spokesperson at government-run Lady Reading Hospital said all 11 people wounded in the Peshawar attack were listed in stable condition.
Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari and Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, in separate statements, condemned the attack in Peshawar, with Zardari calling it a “cowardly act by foreign-backed terrorists,” and Sharif saying the swift response of security forces prevented a larger tragedy.
They offered condolences to the families of the victims.
No group immediately claimed responsibility for the attack, but the Pakistani Taliban, also known as Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), has been blamed for similar previous assaults in the nation, which has witnessed a surge in militant attacks. The TTP is separate from, but allied with the Afghan Taliban that leads Afghanistan.
The latest attack came less than two weeks after a suicide bomber struck outside a court in Pakistan’s capital, Islamabad, detonating his explosives next to a police car and killing 12 people.
The attacks have strained ties between Islamabad and Afghanistan’s Taliban government, with Pakistan accusing the Pakistani Taliban of operating freely inside Afghanistan since the Taliban takeover in 2021.
The Pakistani government often accuses Afghanistan of turning a blind eye to cross-border attacks by militants.
Kabul denies the allegation, but tensions between the two sides escalated after Afghanistan blamed Pakistan for Oct. 9 drone strikes in Kabul and vowed retaliation. The ensuing fighting killed dozens of people, including soldiers, civilians and militants, before Qatar brokered a ceasefire on Oct. 19, which remains in place.
It was followed by two rounds of talks in Istanbul, during which the two sides failed to reach an agreement after Afghanistan refused to give guarantees in writing about preventing the TTP from using Afghan soil for attacks inside Pakistan.
Pakistan has stepped up operations against the TTP, killing dozens of insurgents near regions bordering Afghanistan.
ROCKY RELATIONS: The figures on residents come as Chinese tourist numbers drop following Beijing’s warnings to avoid traveling to Japan The number of Chinese residents in Japan has continued to rise, even as ties between the two countries have become increasingly fractious, data released on Friday showed. As of the end of December last year, the number of Chinese residents had increased by 6.5 percent from the previous year to 930,428. Chinese people accounted for 22.6 percent of all foreign residents in Japan, making them by far the largest group, Japanese Ministry of Justice data showed. Beijing has criticized Tokyo in increasingly strident terms since Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi last year suggested that a military conflict around Taiwan could
A retired US colonel behind a privately financed rocket launch site in the Dominican Republic sees the project as a response to China’s dominance of the space race in Latin America. Florida-based Launch on Demand is slated to begin building a US$600 million facility in a remote region near the border with Haiti late this year. The project is designed to meet surging demand for the heavy-lift rockets needed to put clusters of satellites into orbit. It is also an answer to China’s growing presence in the region, said CEO Burton Catledge, a former commander of the US Air Force’s 45th Operations
Germany is considering Australia’s Ghost Bat robot fighter as it looks to select a combat drone to modernize its air force, German Minister of Defense Boris Pistorius said yesterday. Germany has said it wants to field hundreds of uncrewed fighter jets by 2029, and would make a decision soon as it considers a range of German, European and US projects developing so-called “collaborative combat aircraft.” Australia has said it will integrate the Ghost Bat, jointly developed by Boeing Australia and the Royal Australian Air Force, into its military after a successful weapons test last year. After inspecting the Ghost Bat in Queensland yesterday,
A pro-Iran hacking group claimed to breach FBI Director Kash Patel’s personal e-mail inbox and posted some of the contents online. The e-mails provided by the hacking group include travel details, correspondence with leasing agents in Washington and global entry, and loyalty account numbers. The e-mail address the hackers claim to have compromised has been previously tied to Patel’s personal details, and the leaked e-mails contain photos of Patel and others, in addition to correspondence with family members and colleagues. “The FBI is aware of malicious actors targeting Director Patel’s personal email information,” the agency said in a statement on
RSS