A roadside bomb targeting security forces kills 2 soldiers and wounds 15 in Pakistan

DERA ISMAIL KHAN, Pakistan (AP) — A roadside bomb exploded near a security convoy in northwestern Pakistan on Thursday, killing two soldiers and wounding 15 others, officials said.

The attack happened in Dera Ismail Khan, a former stronghold of the Pakistani Taliban in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province bordering Afghanistan, said Inayat Ullah, head of the police bomb disposal unit in the region.

No group immediately claimed responsibility, but suspicion is likely to fall on the Pakistani Taliban, which has claimed previous attacks on security forces. The Pakistani Taliban, known as Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, is a separate group that has been emboldened since the Afghan Taliban seized power in Afghanistan in 2021.

On Monday, Pakistan targeted TTP hideouts in Afghanistan, drawing condemnations from Kabul.

Pakistan says Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers are giving shelter to TTP fighters across the unruly border. The Afghan Taliban government insists it doesn’t allow anyone to use Afghan soil for violence in any country.

Also Thursday, security forces killed an insurgent commander and wounded two others in an operation in Panjgur, a district in the volatile southwestern Baluchistan province, the military said in a statement.

The operation was conducted a day after Pakistani security forces killed eight insurgents while repulsing an attack by the Baluchistan Liberation Army group on a government building outside Chinese-funded Gwadar port. Three security forces were also killed in the hourslong shootout.