Six terrorists were killed after security forces carried out an intelligence-based operation in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s Karak district, the military’s media affairs wing said on Friday.

According to a press release issued by Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR), security forces effectively engaged after they received information regarding the presence of terrorists in the area.

“During the conduct of operation […] six khawarij were sent to hell,” it said, referring to the term the state uses for members of the banned Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP).

“A sanitisation operation is being conducted to eliminate any other terrorists found in the area,” it said, adding that the security forces were determined to wipe out the menace of terrorism.

Pakistan has recently witnessed an uptick in terror activities, especially in KP and Balochistan. Terror attacks have increased since the TTP broke a fragile ceasefire agreement with the government in 2022.

Last week, security forces killed 13 terrorists in five separate operations carried out across KP on Thursday night.

In separate IBOs on Feb 15, four soldiers were martyred while 15 terrorists were killed in KP on Saturday.

Separately, security forces killed 30 terrorists in an IBO in KP’s South Waziristan district, ISPR said in a statement on Tuesday.

With at least 685 members of security forces losing their lives amid a total of 444 terror attacks, 2024 turned out to be the deadliest year for the civil and military security forces of Pakistan in a decade, according to a 2024 report issued by the Centre for Research and Security Studies think-tank.

According to the ISPR Director General, security forces conducted a total of 59,775 operations last year during which 925 terrorists were killed and 383 officers and soldiers were martyred.