At least 21 people have lost their lives, including 15 police officers, and nearly 80 have been injured after a suicide car bomb attack against a security forces complex in the Pakistani city of Kohat, in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, near the border with Afghanistan.
The head of the Health Department of Kohat, Nasir Hasan Afridi, has confirmed the number of deceased and has indicated that three of the injured are in critical condition, so it is not ruled out that the death toll may rise in the coming hours.
For his part, the provincial police chief, Zulfiqar Hamid, has explained that the attacker detonated the explosives next to the door of a police building, located next to a mosque, and that afterwards several armed men attempted to storm the premises.
"The operation will continue until the total elimination of the members of Fitna al Juarij," he stated, which confirms that the exchange of gunfire with the assailants was still ongoing in the area, according to the Pakistani newspaper 'Dawn'.
Fitna al Juarij is the term used by the authorities of Pakistan to designate the armed group Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), known as the Pakistani Taliban, very active in the border areas with Afghanistan.
The Chief Minister of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Sohail Afridi, has described the attack as "unacceptable" and has emphasized that "the morale of the nation cannot be crushed by cowardly acts of terrorism," while there is still no official claim of responsibility.
In the same vein, the President of Pakistan, Asif Ali Zardari, has condemned the attack and has highlighted in a message on social media that "the total elimination of Fitna al Juarij and of the terrorists operating with foreign support is essential for national security."
The condemnations have been joined by the Prime Minister, Shehbaz Sharif, and the Interior Minister, Mohsin Naqvi, who has insisted that "the cowardly acts of the terrorists cannot weaken the determination of the nation." "The nation stands with the families of the martyrs in these moments of pain," he concluded.
Hours before the attack, the Pakistani Army had reported the death of six soldiers in various operations carried out between September 15 and 17 in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, in which ten alleged members of the Pakistani Taliban would also have died.
This border strip with Afghanistan has been dragging a strong instability for years, marked especially by the attacks of the Pakistani Taliban, in a context of accusations from Islamabad against India and the Afghan Taliban for their supposed support of the group, something that both New Delhi and Kabul have rejected.