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A suicide bomber killed three children and three soldiers in an attack on a military vehicle in Pakistan’s restive northwestern region bordering Afghanistan, officials said on Sunday.
The mountainous frontier separating Pakistan and Afghanistan has long been a hive of militant activity, with fighters using the porous border to escape state security forces.
On Saturday evening a suicide bomber detonated in a small market near Miran Shah in North Waziristan, just 26 kilometres (16 miles) southeast of Afghanistan.
Pakistan’s army said three children aged between four and 11 years-old were killed in the “suicide blast” alongside three soldiers in the heavily militarised area.
“The bomber came by foot and blew himself up when a vehicle of security forces passed by,” a local government official told AFP on condition of anonymity.
Pakistan prime minister Shehbaz Sharif said that “murderers of innocent children are enemies of humanity and Islam”.
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“We will not sit in peace until we hunt down these barbarians and those who patronise them,” he added in a statement.
The attack has not yet been claimed by any militant groups.
The Pakistani Taliban — Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) — has a long history of plotting strikes in the region.
The group is responsible for some of the bloodiest chapters of recent Pakistani history.
