Suicide bombing at police checkpoint in northwestern Pakistan kills at least 11

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DERA ISMAIL KHAN, Pakistan (AP) — A suicide bomber detonated an explosives-laden vehicle at a roadside police checkpoint in northwestern Pakistan on Saturday, killing at least 11 people and wounding about 30 others, officials said, in a sign of increasing violence in the region bordering Afghanistan.

The attack occurred in Dera Ismail Khan, a district in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, said Bilal Faizi, a spokesman for the provincial emergency service. Local police chief Safdar Baloch said most of those killed and wounded were security personnel and passersby.

The Pakistani Taliban, known as Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, or TTP, claimed responsibility for the attack in a statement. Pakistan has experienced a surge in militant attacks in recent years, many of them claimed by the TTP and the outlawed Baloch Liberation Army, or BLA, a separatist group mainly active in neighboring Balochistan province.

The TTP is separate from but closely allied with the Afghan Taliban, which returned to power in Afghanistan in 2021.

Pakistani officials have repeatedly accused the Afghan Taliban of allowing TTP members to operate from Afghan soil and have demanded that Kabul prevent cross-border attacks into Pakistan. Afghan authorities have denied allowing their territory to be used for attacks against other countries.

The latest attack came two days after fighting between Pakistan and Afghanistan along their southwestern border killed at least 13 Afghan Taliban, according to Pakistan’s government. It was the latest escalation between the neighbors following Pakistani strikes on alleged militant hideouts inside Afghanistan this week. The renewed hostilities threaten mediation efforts by China, Turkey, Qatar and Saudi Arabia aimed at securing lasting peace between the two countries.

Dera Ismail Khan is near South Waziristan, a former militant stronghold where the Pakistani military has carried out several operations in recent years.

Militants also frequently target security forces in the region. In December 2023, a suicide bomber detonated an explosives-laden vehicle at the main gate of a police station in Dera Ismail Khan, killing at least 23 security personnel in one of the deadliest attacks in the area. It was claimed by Tehreek-e-Jihad Pakistan, a small militant group believed to be an offshoot of the TTP.

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Ahmed reported from Islamabad. Associated Press writers Riaz Khan and Rasool Dawar in Peshawar, Pakistan, contributed to this report.