Pakistan said Saturday that insurgents ambushed a military convoy overnight in a volatile district bordering Afghanistan, resulting in the deaths of at least six soldiers, including an officer.
The ambush occurred in North Waziristan, a former stronghold of Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan or TTP, a globally designated terrorist organization.
A brief military statement said that six assailants were killed in the ensuing exchange of fire. It identified the slain militants as “Khwarij,” an official reference to TTP.
Multiple area security sources confirmed to VOA that the gunfire had also injured at least 22 Pakistani soldiers.
The Waziristan district is in the northwestern province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, which has experienced a dramatic surge in TTP bombings and gun raids since the Taliban regained power in Kabul three years ago.
Separately, the military reported that an intelligence-driven security operation in the province’s Swat district late on Saturday killed two TTP militant commanders and captured another.
Pakistan says TTP, also referred to as the Pakistani Taliban, is based in Afghanistan and stages cross-border attacks with the help of that country’s Taliban government.
Islamabad alleges that insurgents active in its southwestern Balochistan border province are increasingly using Afghan sanctuaries to orchestrate deadly attacks against the country.
A report this week by the Center for Research and Security Studies documented nearly 1,000 deaths of Pakistani civilians and security forces in the first nine months of this year. The Islamabad-based think tank reported that attacks by TTP and Baloch insurgents caused most of casualties in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan.
The Taliban government, which is officially not recognized by any country, denies Pakistani allegations and insists that neither TTP nor other foreign militant groups are on Afghan soil.
However, recent United Nations Security Council assessments have disputed the Taliban’s assertions and described TTP as “the largest terrorist group” in Afghanistan.
Taliban Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi again questioned U.N. security assessments Friday, claiming their government restored “security and stability nationwide.”
He emphasized, while addressing a Russian-hosted regional conference, that they are in control of the entire Afghan territory and that no one can use it to threaten regional security.
“Occasionally, representatives of some countries in the U.N. Security Council and the media express their concern about the existence of threats on Afghan soil,” Taliban Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi said.
“We believe that the information gap about Afghanistan or disinformation by antagonist circles has found its way to international organizations,” he said, without elaborating.
