Army: 2 Pakistani soldiers, 7 militants killed in shooutouts

Militants with small arms attacked a convoy of Pakistani security forces near the northwest border with Afghanistan, triggering an intense shootout that killed two soldiers and three insurgents, the military said Tuesday.

The firefight happened near Peshawar, the capital of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province. The military provided no further details and the identities of the slain insurgents were not known.

No group immediately claimed responsibility for the attack.

Separately, in an overnight raid, troops killed four militants in Tank, a northwestern town that also borders Afghanistan, the military said. It provided no further details.

Mohammad Khurasani, a spokesperson for the Pakistani Taliban, said the four men killed in Tank were their “holy warriors.” In a statement, he said such military raids indicate that the government and its institutions do not want peace in Pakistan.

The Pakistani Taliban are a separate group but are allies of the Afghan Taliban, who seized power in Afghanistan more than a year ago as the U.S. and NATO troops were in the final stages of their pullout.

The Taliban takeover in Afghanistan has emboldened the Pakistani Taliban, who are known as Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan, or TTP. A monthslong cease-fire between the TTP and Pakistan is intact.

Although the Taliban in Afghanistan have encouraged Islamabad and the TTP to reach a peace agreement, talks between the two sides that started in May have not had results.