At least 11 soldiers were killed and 13 wounded on Saturday after a suicide bomber detonated his explosives near an Army base in northern Pakistan’s Swat Valley, the media wing of the country’s military, the Inter-Services Public Relations, said.
The Tehreek-e-Taliban claimed resposibility for the attack. “God willing Tehreek-e-Taliban has started the process of revenge attack,” the group’s spokesperson Mohammad Khurasani said, according to Reuters. “Wait for more [such attacks] to follow.”
The bomb exploded on Saturday evening when the soldiers were playing volleyball after duty in the unit’s sports area. The authorities had imposed a curfew in the area after the local roads were cordoned off.
The region was controlled by a local faction of the Taliban between 2007 and 2009. However, more than 2,000 Taliban insurgents had been ousted in 2009 in a military operation.
Pakistan Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi condemnded the attack and said the country will continue their fight against terrorism till the “last trace is rooted out”. “No cowardly attack can deter us in pursuing our struggle against the menace of terrorism to its logical conclusion,” he said.
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