At least three, including soldier, martyred in Miranshah suicide attack

A civilian also sustained injuries in the attack on security forces, says ISPR

MIRANSHAH:

At least three people including a Pakistan Army solider were martyred when a suicide attacker struck a security forces vehicle in North Waziristan’s Miranshah area on Monday, said the military in a statement.

The Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) said a civilian also sustained injuries in the attack.

“Resultantly, Naik Abid (age 33 years, resident of Mansehra) and 2 civilians embraced shahadat [martyrdom] while one civilian was injured in the incident,” read the ISPR statement.

According to police officials, the attacker rammed a rickshaw into the vehicle and blew himself up.

Security officials had earlier confirmed that both civilian and security personnel were among the casualties.

The injured were shifted to DHQ Miranshah Hospital and the blast site was cordoned off by security officials and an investigation was initiated.

Yesterday, police in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa had come under militant attack in Lakki Marwat, leading to a fierce exchange of fire that resulted in the martyrdom of at least four policemen and injuries to as many, officials said on Sunday.

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Local police officials had said that militants attacked the Bargai police station early in the morning with rockets and grenades. “There was a fierce exchange of fire between the police and terrorists. The attackers threw hand grenades and fired rockets toward the police station,” a police official said.

Moreover, earlier this week, at least three people had been killed and five others were injured after a suicide bomber blew himself up in Miranshah town.

According to government sources, most of the casualties had been pedestrians in the area.

K-P continues to see a surge in terrorist attacks, since last month when the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) said that they have called off a ceasefire agreed upon with the federal government in June and ordered its militants to stage terrorist attacks across the country.

The TTP, a separate entity from the Taliban in Afghanistan but sharing a similar hardline ideology, have been responsible for hundreds of attacks and thousands of deaths since emerging in 2007.

The government and the TTP had agreed to a truce earlier this year after Afghanistan's new Taliban rulers took a prominent role in brokering peace talks, but negotiations made little progress and there were frequent breaches.