A car bombing followed by an armed ambush killed at least 21 police officers in northwestern Pakistan late Saturday, according to police and security officials, in one of the deadliest recent attacks targeting security forces in the country.
The assault took place in Bannu district, in Pakistan’s northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province near the border with Afghanistan.
Pakistani officials said attackers first detonated an explosives-laden vehicle near a police checkpoint before launching a coordinated assault on responding security personnel.
Quoted by the Associated Press, Zahid Khan, a local police official, said that the powerful explosion caused the police post to collapse, triggering multiple blasts and an intense firefight.
Images circulating after the attack showed the checkpoint reduced to rubble, with debris, destroyed vehicles and burned wreckage scattered across the area.
According to Reuters, security officials said police reinforcements rushing to the scene were later ambushed by militants, resulting in additional casualties.
“Other law enforcement personnel were sent to help the police, but the terrorists ambushed them and caused some casualties,” a police official told Reuters.
Police sources said the attackers also used drones during the assault, underscoring the increasingly sophisticated tactics employed by militant groups operating in the region.
An alliance of armed groups calling itself Ittehad-ul-Mujahideen Pakistan claimed responsibility for the attack.
Local media reports said nearby civilian areas were also damaged in the blasts, and at least two civilians were wounded.
Emergency teams and ambulances were dispatched to the scene, while hospitals in Bannu declared emergency measures to treat the wounded.
At least three injured people remained hospitalized on Sunday, according to local officials.
The attack comes amid a sharp rise in militant violence across Pakistan, particularly in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and neighboring Balochistan province.
Pakistani authorities have repeatedly blamed the resurgence of violence on militant groups allegedly operating from Afghanistan’s territory, especially the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan, or TTP, though the Taliban deny allowing Afghanistan’s soil to be used against other countries.
Relations between Islamabad and Taliban have deteriorated significantly over the past two years, with Pakistan carrying out airstrikes and military operations near the border and accusing Taliban of failing to dismantle militant sanctuaries.
Taliban reject those accusations and say Pakistan’s security problems are internal matters.
Pakistan has witnessed a surge in attacks on police, soldiers and government officials since the Taliban returned to power in Afghanistan in 2021, raising fears of widening instability along the border regions.
