SOUTH WAZIRISTAN: Four soldiers were martyred in a terrorist attack on a check-post in the Makeen area of South Waziristan tribal district late on Thursday night.

The Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) said in a statement on Friday that four terrorists were also killed when security personnel retaliated.

The military’s media wing confirmed the martyrdom of four soldiers.

Sources said that a group of 10 terrorists had attacked the check-post in the Makeen area dominated by the Mehsud tribe. They said the attackers used both heavy and light weapons in the attack, which resulted in the martyrdom of four soldiers.

In retaliatory fire, four out of 10 Taliban attackers killed: ISPR

The martyred soldiers were identified as Lance Naik Imran Ali, Sepoy Atif Jehangir, Sepoy Aziz and Sepoy Anees Rehman.

The sources said that the four terrorists who were killed in the retaliatory firing belonged to the banned Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP). Their identity could not be ascertained.

The ISPR said that a clearance operation was also launched in the area after the attack.

In North Waziristan, a picket of security forces came under attack in the Degan area of Datakhel tehsil of North Waziristan tribal district on Friday.

Sources said that the security forces retaliated and returned fire, but the attackers escaped.

Later, the security forces encircled the area and launched a search operation to arrest the attackers.

In another incident, the bullet-riddled body of a young man was found in Dosali tehsil.

Sources said that the victim, identified as Jadoon, had been missing for the last three days.

Police reached the spot soon after receiving information about the presence of the body and shifted it to the district headquarters hospital in Miramshah for an autopsy.

In Bajaur, security forces on Friday claimed to have thwarted a terror bid of a banned organisation and recovered a huge cache of arms and explosive devices during an intelligence-based operation in the border locality of Bajaur tribal district.

Officials said that the weapons included explosive devices, hundreds of kilograms of ordnance and ammunition.

The weapons were recovered from a hilly locality of Charming valley in Nawagai tehsil.

They said that after receiving information about the presence of weapons and explosives, a contingent of security forces moved to the area, located near the Pak-Afghan border, and recovered the weapons which were kept at difference places.

They claimed that the weapons were meant to be used in attacks on security forces and other terrorist activities by the militants associated with the banned TTP at the behest of Indian intelligence agency RAW.

However, they added, the security forces had thwarted the terrorists’ mission by recovering the weapons.

Pazeer Gul in North Waziristan and Anwarullah Khan in Bajaur also contributed to this report

Published in Dawn, February 13th, 2021