Cross-border attack : TTP militants storm border post in Mohmand

Officials say the attack left five border guards and 13 attackers dead.

GHALLANAI:

Taliban insurgents mounted a brazen cross-border raid on Pakistani border guards in the Mohamand tribal region, triggering a fierce gunfight that left five paramilitary troops and over a dozen raiders dead.

Hordes of heavily armed militants attacked a paramilitary checkpoint located on top of a hill in the Bayzai sub-division of Mohmand Agency, a senior official of the political administration told The Express Tribune.

“Fifty to sixty militants stormed the Olai post in the Khwezai area, hardly a few kilometers from the Afghan border, at around 12:15am on Monday,” Riaz Khan said. “Our forces successfully defended the post and repulsed the attack,” he added.

Khan said the attackers had crossed over from eastern Afghanistan where, according to reports, they hold sway. Khan confirmed that five border guards and 13 militants were killed in the skirmish.

Olai post had been set up to check infiltration of Taliban insurgents into Pakistan from the Nazarkhel area of the Afghan province of Nangarhar.

Official sources added that one of border guards also went missing after the attack. However, a spokesperson for the paramilitary Frontier Corps (FC) said that the missing soldier has returned safely.

After the attack, Political Agent of Mohmand Agency Adil Siddiq visited the Olai post along with Mohmand Rifles Commandant Colonel Azeem.

The Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) spokesperson in the region claimed responsibility for the attack. Mukarram Khurasani told local journalists by phone from somewhere in Afghanistan that only one of the attackers was killed. He claimed that they have seized one of the troops manning the post.

TTP militants based in eastern and northeastern Afghanistan have sporadically mounted cross-border attacks on Pakistani posts in Dir and Chitral districts of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa and in the tribal regions of Bajaur and Mohmand.

Separately, a jirga of tribal elders was convened in Ghalanai, the headquarters of Mohmand Agency to discuss the fluid security situation in the region.

Administration official Fazal Karim told The Express Tribune that tribal elders assured the authorities that they would ensure peace and order in their region. A follow-up jirga would be convened on April 5 where the administration will hand over 42 tribesmen to the jirga.

These men were detained under the collective responsibility clause of Frontier Crimes Regulation (FCR) following the bombing of a telephone exchange, a basic health unit and a school in Bayzai area.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 3^rd, 2012.