Attack on checkpoint kills 9 police officers in northern Pakistan

Armed militants killed nine police officers in an attack on a checkpoint in northern Pakistan on Wednesday that also left 15 of the gunmen dead in ensuing fighting, police said. The attack took place in Hangu district in Pakistan's northern border province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa where authorities are fighting a growing insurgency.

"Nine police personnel were killed and 26 others injured in the attack... Police killed 15 militants and wounded dozens more," Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Police said in a statement. "An armoured personnel carrier and several other police vehicles were also badly damaged during the clash," it added. The Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) group, which has intensified its insurgency in the region, claimed responsibility for the attack in a video statement circulated on social media.

Unidentified militants attacked on Friday another checkpoint in the Tank district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. In Friday's attack, militants rammed an explosives-laden vehicle into a security checkpoint, killing 15 people, including soldiers, police officers and government personnel. Security forces killed 12 militants, according to the military.

Pakistan has previously blamed the increase in attacks in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and the southern border province of Balochistan on militancy emanating from Afghanistan, whose Taliban government denies Afghan involvement.

The accusations have sparked a bitter rift and armed conflict between the neighbouring countries, and Pakistan has carried out deadly air strikes it says target militants on Afghan soil. The Taliban government and the United Nations said dozens of civilians were killed in the latest Pakistani strikes on eastern Afghanistan in June.

Agence France-Presse