Pakistani forces end local Taliban siege of anti-terror office

Islamabad, Dec 20 (EFE).- Pakistani forces on Tuesday freed a center of the Counter-Terrorism Department under siege by militants of the Pakistani Taliban since Sunday, in an operation in which at least two soldiers and an undetermined number of Islamists were killed.

“All terrorists were killed,” Defense Minister Khawaja Office said in the parliament, without revealing the number of insurgents killed in the operation.

The center housed 33 people accused of having links with the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan, the main Taliban faction in the country.

The operation at the CTD facility in Bannu, situated in the northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, began on Dec. 20 at 12.30 pm local time and continued for several hours.

At least two commandoes of the special forces were killed and around a dozen injured, Asif said.

The insurgents had seized control of the center on Sunday during an interrogation, after they snatched weapons from officials and took some officers hostage.

The rebels also released some of their fellow prisoners and had demanded a safe exit onboard a helicopter to Afghanistan, which has been under the control of the Afghan Taliban since August 2021.

The minister said that the number of terror attacks have been rising in the country and alleged that there were signs of cross-border support for the insurgents from neighboring Afghanistan.

“The unfortunate aspect of this is that terrorism is again making strides in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan,” Asif said, adding that “there is clear evidence that terrorists from across the border or locally are rising again.”

The TTP is an umbrella group of several armed organizations established in 2007 with the aim of establishing an Islamic state in Pakistan.

Since its inception, the group has carried out a brutal campaign of terrorist attacks across the country and killed thousands of people, including an assassination attempt in 2012 against activist Malala Yousafzai, who was later awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. EFE

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