By Staff Reporter
ISLAMABAD: Security forces killed nine suspected militants, including a suicide bomber, during separate intelligence-based operations in Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, the military said Monday, even as militants carried out a complex ambush in the northwest that left three paramilitary officers dead.
The announcements from the Inter-Services Public Relations, the military’s media wing, described the operations as targeting what the authorities call “Indian-sponsored” members of the banned Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan, also referred to by the state as Fitna al-Khawarij. Weapons, ammunition and, in one case, explosives were recovered from the sites, and the slain militants were said to have been actively involved in terrorist activities in their respective areas.
In the first operation, conducted on Sunday in Pishin district of Balochistan, security forces engaged a group of militants equipped with multiple weapons. After an intense exchange of fire, a suicide bomber detonated his explosives, and four other militants were killed, according to the ISPR statement. The Balochistan Counter-Terrorism Department separately confirmed the raid, saying the group had planned to attack police lines and Cadet College Pishin.
Earlier Monday, the military reported a second operation in Dera Ismail Khan district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, launched on intelligence about the presence of militants. Security personnel engaged the location, leading to a heavy firefight that left four militants dead. Weapons and ammunition were recovered there as well. Both ISPR statements noted that sanitization operations were continuing to eliminate any remaining militants in the areas. They added that the broader counterterrorism campaign, known as Azm-i-Istehkam and approved by the Federal Apex Committee on the National Action Plan, would proceed at full pace “to wipe out the menace of foreign-sponsored and supported terrorism from the country.”
President Asif Ali Zardari and Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif commended the security forces for the Pishin operation, according to state-run Radio Pakistan. Zardari said the action against the “Indian-backed Fitna al Khawarij” reflected the nation’s resolve in the fight against terrorism and that the war would continue until the complete eradication of the menace. Sharif highlighted the progress being made by security forces “every single day with courage, determination and strength” and reaffirmed that the entire nation stood with the armed forces and law enforcement agencies.
The operations come as Pakistani authorities have stepped up counterterrorism efforts in response to a tense security situation in Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. Last week, on Feb. 18, the Balochistan Counter-Terrorism Department reported that 14 suspected militants were killed in separate actions in Quetta’s Darakhshan area and Barkhan district. A day later, the ISPR said four “Indian-sponsored” militants were killed in an operation in Lakki Marwat district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
On the same day as the latest military announcements, however, militants struck in Karak district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, killing three members of the Federal Constabulary. According to Karak police spokesperson Shaukat Khan, the assault began with a quadcopter attack on a Federal Constabulary fort in the Dargah Shaheedan area, where four rounds of explosives were detonated, injuring four personnel.
The paramilitary forces returned fire, and the exchange continued for some time. Rescue 1122 ambulances arrived to evacuate the injured, but terrorists ambushed them near Ghole Banda Dam. Three Federal Constabulary personnel were killed in the attack on the ambulances, which caught fire and were destroyed, police said. District Police Officer Saood Khan confirmed the deaths. Three Rescue 1122 officials were injured, two of them critically, according to the service’s spokesperson Asif Khan.
Pakistan Peoples Party Chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari condemned the attack as “cowardly and inhumane,” according to a statement from the party’s media cell. He said those who opened fire on an ambulance had proven they reject the teachings of Islam. Bilawal paid tribute to the martyred personnel and offered condolences to their families. He stressed that “a Muslim cannot even think of harming an animal, let alone a human being, in the holy month of Ramazan.”
The Karak incident is the latest in a series of attacks on security forces in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. Last week, a terrorist attack involving an explosive-laden vehicle on a checkpost in Bajaur district killed 11 security personnel. On Feb. 18, two Federal Constabulary personnel were injured in an assault on a checkpost in the Salgazi area of Wazir subdivision. In November, three Federal Constabulary personnel were killed in a suicide attack on the force’s headquarters in Peshawar’s Saddar area.
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa has seen a marked increase in violence over the past year. The Centre for Research and Security Studies’ Annual Security Report 2025 recorded a surge in fatalities in the province, rising from 1,620 in 2024 to 2,331 in 2025 — an absolute increase of 711 deaths that accounted for more than 82 percent of the net national rise and a nearly 44 percent year-on-year jump in violence there.
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