Two policemen were injured in an overnight attack by terrorists on a police checkpost in Puran tehsil of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s Shangla district, police said on Thursday.
Aloch Station House Officer (SHO) Bakht Zeb Khan said dawn.com that more than a dozen attackers attacked the checkpoint late at night, however, the police personnel on duty foiled the attack, forcing the attackers to flee.
The SHO said, “Two policemen were injured when they retaliated against the terrorists.”
Rescue 1122 spokesperson Rasool Khan Sharif confirmed that dawn.com that two policemen were injured in the attack, adding that they were taken to Pir Muhammad Khan Shaheed Hospital and referred to Saidu Teaching Hospital in Swat for further treatment.
After learning of the attack, two dawn.com Correspondents said local political leaders from different parties called on local residents to oppose the attackers and fight alongside them. They led the armed group to the police post, but the attackers had already fled the area.
Of late, the country has witnessed a sharp rise in the number of attacks on security forces, other law enforcement agencies and security checkpoints, particularly in Balochistan and KP.
Police checkpoints in remote areas of Shangla district are considered vulnerable to terrorist attacks due to their location in isolated regions surrounded by forests.
A senior police officer, who spoke on condition of anonymity, criticized the construction of checkpoints in isolated locations.
In another attack on December 17, more than 30 terrorists stormed a police checkpost in Gunangar area of Chakesar, situated about 10 kilometers from the Karakoram Highway in Dandai area. The attack left an assistant sub-inspector and an agent dead, and injured three other people.
The Tehreek Taliban Pakistan (TTP) group from the Malakand region accepted responsibility for the attack and confirmed it on their social media account, while warning that they would attack more targets in the near future in Shangla and parts of the region.
