At least six Pakistani policemen were killed Wednesday in an attack by the armed group Tehrik Taliban Pakistan (TTP), known as the Pakistani Taliban, on a patrol in the town of Lakki Marwat, in the Jiber Pakhtunkhwa region (north).
According to reports on the Pakistani television channel Geo TV, the dead included an assistant sub-inspector. The officers were on a routine patrol when they were shot at by two assailants on a motorcycle.
Pakistani police have indicated that an operation is underway to try to capture those responsible for the attack, while the TTP has claimed responsibility for the incident, as reported by the German news agency DPA.
Pakistan’s President Arif Alvi has «strongly» condemned the attack and expressed his «grief over the loss of precious lives in the terrorist incident». He also said that the sacrifices of the security forces in the «war against terrorism» are «unforgettable».
Alvi stressed that «such cowardly acts cannot shake the nation’s resolve against the menace of terrorism,» while Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said that «terrorists are enemies of Pakistan,» state-run Radio Pakistan reported.
In this regard, Sharif paid tribute to the deceased and said that «the whole nation salutes the sons of the land who sacrificed their lives for the homeland», before ordering the regional government to provide compensation for the families of the officers killed in the attack.
The TTP, which differs from the Afghan Taliban in organizational matters but follows the same rigorist interpretation of Sunni Islam, brings together more than a dozen Islamist militant groups operating in Pakistan, where they have killed some 70,000 people in two decades of violence.
