Attacks on police in KP’s Peshawar, Lakki Marwat foiled – Pakistan

Terrorist attacks on police stations and checkposts continued in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s Lakki Marwat and Peshawar districts but the cops managed to repel both of them, authorities said on Monday.

The development follows a spate of attacks in the Peshawar, Karak, Bannu, Lakki Marwat and Bajaur districts of KP over the past two days, in which two policemen were martyred and five other individuals were injured.

Pakistan has witnessed an uptick in terror activities over the past year, especially in KP and Balochistan, after the proscribed Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) ended its ceasefire with the government in November 2022.

Last night, the Gambila police station in Lakki Marwat was targeted, but the Quick Response Force (QRF) opened fire in retaliation, causing the Fitna Al Khawarij to flee in the dark, an official police statement read.

Fitna Al Khawarij is a term the state uses to refer to the banned TTP.

According to the Lakki Marwat police, cops confronted “15-16 terrorists of Fitna Al Khawarij as soon as they noticed their presence and movement on the west and south of the Gambila police station” at 12:15am.

“The exchange of fire continued for 15 minutes,” the statement said, forcing the terrorists to flee. “The police party remained safe,” it added.

In another incident, unknown men hurled a grenade at a checkpost in Peshawar’s Malazai area late on Sunday night, Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP) Operations Masood Bangash told Dawn.com.

However, SSP Bangash added, that no damage had occurred.

Kalimullah group was eliminated, the statement said, without specifying the day or further details of the action.

According to the CPO, Azmatullah was a highly wanted individual by the KP Counter-Terrorism Department (CTD) as he had been involved in a recent attack on a Frontier Corps (FC) fort, various police station and checkpost attacks, the targeted killing of constable Irfan, a bank robbery, abductions as well as social media threats.

Azmatullah was killed two days ago in an operation conducted in response to the recent attacks, Karak District Police Officer (DPO) Shehbaz Elahi told Dawn.com.

Detailing the attacks, the CPO recalled that militants attacked a police post located in Lakki Marwat’s Abbasa Khattak area two days ago, but the cops “fought back resolutely”.

In the meantime, a vehicle in the convoy led by Lakki Marwat DPO Jawwad Ishaq was also targeted by an improvised explosive device (IED). However, the statement said, that the “injured police party sent one khawarij to hell while six to seven terrorists succeeded in fleeing”.

Later, the police led by DPO Ishaq destroyed temporary hideouts of TTP terrorists on the border of Lakki Marwat and Karak, the CPO highlighted.

“During the entire operation, KP Inspector General of Police (IG) Zulfiqar Hameed was in constant contact with the Lakki and Karak DPOs to instruct them.”

A second terrorist was killed in the Tank district, while “many” were injured in an hours-long retaliatory action by the police after the Nasraan checkpost was attacked, according to the CPO statement.

The statement also recalled the martyrdoms of additional sub-inspector (ASI) Islam Noor Khan in an assault on Karak’s Takht-e-Nasrati police station, as well as of cons­t­able Nazar Ali in an attack on Peshawar’s Paj­gai post last night.

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