At least 21 people, including 15 police officers, were killed and more than 100 injured when a bomb‑laden vehicle tore into the Kohat Police Lines on Friday, followed by gunmen storming the compound and attacking police buildings.
District Health Officer Dr Nasir Hassan Afridi confirmed the death toll to Dawn, adding that three of the injured were in critical condition. Among the dead were SP Traffic Akbar Shinwari and Dr Israel Orakzai, head of the children’s department at DHQ KDA Kohat.
According to police, the assault began when a vehicle‑borne explosive detonated at the boundary wall near the mosque inside the police lines. At least seven attackers then breached the compound and moved toward the CTD and Special Branch buildings. Six assailants, including a suicide bomber, were killed in the ensuing firefight, while at least one gunman remained holed up inside, prompting a clearance operation that continued into the evening, as reported by Dawn News.
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Inspector General Zulfiqar Hameed visited the site as the operation entered its “final stages” around 3:30 p.m., vowing that police would continue until the “complete elimination of Tehreek‑i‑Taliban Pakistan. Television footage showed residents digging through rubble beside a collapsed wall, helping pull out the injured as smoke rose over the damaged mosque.
The attack was claimed by the Hafiz Gul Bahadur‑led Ittehadul Mujahideen. KP Chief Minister Sohail Afridi called the targeting of civilians “deeply regrettable and unacceptable,” ordering immediate treatment for the wounded and insisting that “the nation’s morale cannot be dampened by cowardly acts of terrorism.”
Funeral prayers for the 15 martyred police personnel were held in Kohat later in the evening, before their bodies were taken to their home districts Kohat, Karak, Lakki Marwat, Bannu and Mardan in Rescue 1122 ambulances.
The violence echoed a 2010 bombing in a police colony behind the same lines, which killed 20 people, mostly relatives of officers, and injured more than 90.
