ISLAMABAD (The Thursday Times) — Pakistan’s security forces have killed 74 terrorists in a series of intelligence-based operations in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan, the military’s media wing said on Friday.
In Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, troops killed 35 terrorists in Mir Ali, North Waziristan, and eight in Orakzai over the past 48 hours after “intense and fierce exchanges of fire”, the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) said. It described them as members of Fitna al-Khawarij, the name the state uses for the banned Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan, which it says is backed by India.
In Balochistan, an area sanitisation operation in the Kurram area of Quetta district, under way since November 3, killed 31 terrorists from Fitna al-Khawarij and Fitna al-Hindustan, the military said. The state uses the second name for Baloch separatist groups.
Troops recovered a large cache of weapons, ammunition, and explosives, including homemade explosives and improvised explosive devices, which the ISPR said had been meant for terrorist attacks. Sanitisation operations were continuing to clear any terrorists still holed up in the areas, it said.
The campaign under Azm-e-Istehkam, the counterterrorism plan approved by the federal apex committee on the National Action Plan, would continue “at full pace to wipe out the menace of foreign-sponsored and supported terrorism from the country”, the ISPR said.
Leaders praise the troops
President Asif Ali Zardari praised the security forces, saying their continued successes reflected national resolve and professional skill, and that eliminating foreign-sponsored terrorist networks was a national security imperative.
Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif paid tribute to the officers and soldiers involved and commended them for destroying several terrorist hideouts. Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi said: “I salute the security forces for sending a large number of terrorists to hell.”
A rising toll
The operations came a day after terrorists drove an explosives-laden vehicle at the Frontier Corps’ Kandawa post on the N-25 highway in Mastung, an attack that killed two civilians and injured 16 people. Earlier this week, police in Khyber killed a wanted TTP commander and repelled an attack on a station in Dera Ismail Khan.
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan accounted for about 96% of violence-related deaths in Pakistan in the second quarter of 2026, according to the Centre for Research and Security Studies, with 475 deaths in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and 265 in Balochistan. Pakistan has repeatedly accused Afghanistan’s Taliban government of letting the TTP operate from Afghan soil, a charge Kabul denies.
