PESHAWAR, Pakistan (AP) — Suspected militants ambushed a vehicle carrying a government official in northwest Pakistan on Tuesday, killing him, two of his guards and a passerby, officials said.
Police officer Alam Khan said the attack took place in Bannu district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province. He identified the slain administrator as Shah Wali, who served in Miran Shah near the Afghan border.
A day earlier, a senior police officer was killed in a suicide bombing near a police vehicle in the northwest district of Lakki Marwat.
No group claimed responsibility for the attack, but the suspect was likely the Pakistani Taliban, known as Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan. The group is independent of but allied with Afghanistan’s Taliban government and has been blamed by authorities for previous attacks.
Pakistan has seen a steady rise in armed violence, straining relations with Afghanistan. Islamabad accuses the TTP of operating freely in Afghanistan since the Taliban takeover in 2021, a charge Kabul denies.
Tensions escalated last month after the Taliban government accused Pakistan of launching a drone attack on Kabul on 9 October. Cross-border clashes ensued, killing dozens of soldiers, civilians and militants, before a Qatar-brokered ceasefire on 19 October. Although recent talks between the two sides in Istanbul failed to reach an agreement, the ceasefire agreement remains in effect.
