Roadside bombing kills 3 police officers in northwest Pakistan

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PESHAWAR, Pakistan (AP) — A powerful roadside bomb struck a police vehicle Friday in a former stronghold of the Pakistani Taliban in the country’s northwest near the Afghan border, killing a city police chief and two junior officers, officials said.

The bombing took place in the city of Hangu in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province as the officers were heading to a police station that had been attacked less than an hour earlier, local police chief Adam Khan said. He gave no further details.

Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi condemned the attacks and blamed the Pakistani Taliban for the violence.

The latest assaults came a day before Pakistan and Afghanistan are scheduled to hold a second round of peace talks in Istanbul, following an initial meeting in Qatari capital Doha on Oct. 19. Those talks, brokered by Qatar and Turkey, followed deadly border clashes that left dozens dead on both sides and led to a temporary ceasefire that remains in place.

The Pakistani Taliban, known as Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan or TTP, is a separate group but a close ally of Afghanistan’s Taliban, which returned to power in Kabul in August 2021 after the withdrawal of U.S. and NATO forces.

Since then, many TTP fighters and leaders have found refuge in Afghanistan, some living openly under Taliban rule — a situation that has emboldened the group and strained ties between Pakistan and Afghanistan. The TTP frequently targets security forces and civilians inside Pakistan.

All border crossings between Pakistan and Afghanistan have been closed since Oct. 13 following deadly clashes between the two sides.

Pakistan and Afghanistan share a 2,611-kilometer (1,622-mile) border known as the Durand Line, which Afghanistan has never formally recognized.