Five Police Killed in Karak District Ambush

Five Pakistani police personnel were killed in a militant ambush involving explosives and gunfire in the Karak district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province on Tuesday, officials reported, amid a broader surge in attacks on security forces near the Afghan border.

The assault occurred during a routine patrol near an oil and gas field, according to local police chief Noor Wali. Militants first detonated an improvised explosive device under the officers' van before opening fire, killing four officers and the driver, provincial police said. A heavy police contingent quickly cordoned off the area and launched a search operation to apprehend the attackers, while investigators collected evidence at the scene. No group has claimed responsibility for the incident, though authorities suspect involvement by affiliates of the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan, or TTP, an Islamist militant network that has waged an insurgency against the Pakistani state for nearly two decades.

Pakistan's Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif condemned the attack, stating that "police have always played a frontline role in the war against terrorism." Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Chief Minister Sohail Afridi echoed the sentiment, calling the...