DERA ISMAIL KHAN, June 25: Militants wearing suicide vests, one of them in a burqa, stormed a police station in Kolachi town on Saturday, killing 10 security personnel and destroying an armoured personnel carrier (APC). Three policemen were injured.

Kolachi is some 60kms west of Dera Ismail Khan town, close to the Jandola Frontier Region.

A police official said two suicide bombers detonated their explosives-packed vests near the main gate when the APC carrying reinforcements was entering the besieged police station. A portion of the building caught fire and substantial government record was destroyed.

Police took control of the police station after a four-hour standoff.Deputy Inspector General of Police Imtiaz Shah said a search was under way amid reports that two attackers were in the building.

According to agency reports, five attackers had been killed.

The militants kept around two dozen policemen hostage in the compound adjacent to the local degree college housing troops.

(According to AP, the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistani (TTP) claimed they had carried out the attack, saying it was partly aimed at avenging the US raid that killed Osama bin Laden last month. The TTP said one of the two suicide bombers was a woman).

Smoke billowed from the police station after three loud explosions were heard.

Witnesses said three men on a motorbike -- one wearing a burqa -- threw grenades and opened fire to make their way into the police station.

Heavy gunfire shook the area as soon as the attackers entered the compound. Contingents of the Elite Force and police were sent from the regional headquarters in Dera Ismail Khan to end the siege.

The town reverberated with the sound of the ferocious shootout.

A policeman, Mohammad Amin, told Dawn by cell phone that he and three of his colleagues were stranded in a small room and had no information about the situation. “I have no idea about the number of the attackers,” he said before the siege ended.

Witnesses said they had seen the driver jumping out of the damaged APC.

The sources said some of the policemen were taking rest and some others preparing for ablution when the militants launched the brazen attack.

The attackers locked the gate and made the policemen hostage.

A doctor said five injured policemen had been brought to hospital.

Security forces cordoned off the area and launched a search operation.

AFP adds: The attackers damaged the boundary wall of the police station with grenades to enable more militants to follow them into the building.

District police chief Mohammad Hussain Khan said it was likely that the attackers had come from the tribal area.