From At least 31 said killed in bombing and gun attack in Pakistan police station, fighting ongoing
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At least 31 people, including 16 police personnel, were killed and over 100 injured in a suicide bombing and gun attack at a police headquarters in northern Pakistan Friday afternoon, with the fighting ongoing on Saturday, a senior police official tells AFP.
“Several militants are still holed up in the Special Branch section of the Kohat Police Complex,” the official tells AFP on condition of anonymity.
“An exchange of fire with them has been ongoing since late last night. Their exact number remains unclear,” the official adds.
Attackers had stormed the Old Police Lines complex at Kohat, a town of around 220,000 people in Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) province. The police compound serves as a district-level police headquarters, housing key offices of the Counter Terrorism Department (CTD), Special Branch and several other police units.
Pakistan has blamed the increase in attacks in KP and the southern border province of Balochistan on fighters emanating from Afghanistan, where the Taliban government denies Afghan involvement.
The accusations have sparked a bitter rift and armed conflict between the neighboring countries, and Pakistan has carried out deadly airstrikes it says target fighters on Afghan soil.
The Taliban government in Kabul and the United Nations said dozens of civilians were killed in the latest Pakistani strikes on eastern Afghanistan in June.
The Times of Israel Community.