At least 24 people, including children, have been killed in explosions in a remote area of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province in northwestern Pakistan, triggering calls for an investigation into the incident.
A local police official said bomb-making material allegedly stored at a compound run by Pakistan Taliban, known by the acronym TTP, exploded in the Tirah Valley region early on Monday, killing fighters and civilians.
But many local opposition figures and other authorities accused the Pakistani military of carrying out night-time air raids as part of a “counterterror operation” to take out fighters in mountainous areas bordering Afghanistan.
An official statement has yet to be released by the Pakistani government or armed forces.
Local police officer Zafar Khan was quoted as saying by The Associated Press news agency that at least 10 civilians, including women and children, were killed, along with at least 14 fighters, two of whom were TTP commanders.
Security forces are carrying out operations against the Pakistan Taliban in Khyber, Bajaur and other parts of the northwest. The outlawed group has been waging an armed rebellion against Pakistan’s government since its emergence in 2007. It is different from the Taliban that has been in power in Afghanistan, though the organisations have common ideological roots.
‘An attack on unarmed civilians’
Iqbal Afridi – an opposition member of the National Assembly whose constituency covers Tirah, which sits near the border with Afghanistan – told the AFP news agency that warplanes of Pakistani forces conducted air strikes that caused the explosions.
Speaking in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Provincial Assembly on Monday afternoon, lawmaker Sohail Khan Afridi also blamed the military for the attack.
“This assault by the security forces is nothing less than an attack on unarmed civilians,” he said.
Both politicians are members of the party led by jailed former Prime Minister Imran Khan, which governs the province.
Babar Saleem Swati, the provincial assembly speaker, wrote in a post on X that civilians were killed and homes were destroyed “due to bombardment by jet aircraft” and said this will have negative consequences for the future of the country.
“When the blood of our own people is made so cheap and bombs are dropped on them, it is a fire that can engulf everyone,” Swati said, calling on federal and provincial governments to conduct a transparent investigation and compensate affected families.
The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, an independent monitor, said it was “deeply shocked” to learn that children and civilians were killed in the attack.
“We demand that the authorities carry out an immediate and impartial inquiry into the incident and hold to account those responsible. The state is constitutionally bound to protect all civilians’ right to life, which it has repeatedly failed to secure,” it said in a statement.
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