Pak Taliban kill 4 cops in shootout in Balochistan
- In Reports
- 11:50 AM, Jul 03, 2023
- Myind Staff
Pakistani officials said four security officials were killed in a shootout on July 2 in the southwestern Balochistan Province, an attack claimed by the Pakistan Taliban.
At a highway checkpoint in the Zhob area, about a dozen militants opened fire on police officers and paramilitary Frontier Constabulary members, starting a two-hour gunfight.
"Four of the security officials, including three policemen and one Frontier Corps officer, were killed in the attack. One of the suspected attackers has also been killed but not yet identified," Zhob's commissioner, Saeed Umrani, told AFP.
Local police chief, Abdul Salam Baloch said one of the militants was also killed while the others managed to escape to the mountainous terrain in the Shirani district, bordering North Waziristan where they have multiple hideouts.
Baloch said the attackers used hand grenades, rocket-propelled grenades, and assault rifles on the joint security post of police and paramilitary forces.
Bilal Shabbir, a top administrative officer in the Shirani district, said that security forces launched a search operation in the area and surrounding mountains to trace and eliminate the perpetrators.
The Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) later claimed the attack in a statement, identifying the attacker shot dead by police.
TTP is a separate group but allied with the Afghan Taliban, who seized power in the neighboring country in August 2021 as U.S. and NATO troops were in the final stages of their pullout.
The Taliban takeover of Afghanistan has emboldened the Pakistani Taliban, which has stepped up attacks on police and troops in recent months after unitarily ending a cease-fire with the government.
Four policemen in Kuchlak, Balochistan, were killed in April in a gunbattle with terrorists identified by police as being from the Pakistan Taliban.
In January, a suicide bomber linked to the TTP blew himself up in a mosque inside a police compound in the northwestern city of Peshawar, killing more than 80 officers.
Pakistan’s military has carried out major operations in recent years in the tribal belt along the Afghan border, which has served as a safe haven for local and foreign militants for decades. However, militants still carry out attacks in the region.
Image source: VOA
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