Police rule out a “terror attack” in the two explosions at an anti-terrorism facility in the northwest.
Pakistani police say the double blast that hit an anti-terrorism facility in the northwest of the country was caused by an electrical short circuit and not a “terror attack” as initially suggested.
The death toll from Monday’s explosions at the ammunition depot in the town of Kabal in the Swat district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province bordering Afghanistan has risen to 17, police said on Tuesday.
The dead included nine police officers, five detainees and three civilians, local police chief Shafiullah Gandapur said. According to Akhtar Hayat, another provincial police officer, more than 50 people, mostly police officers, were also injured when the shorts set off explosions seconds apart.
Police initially said the explosions could have been an act of “terrorism,” but an investigation later concluded that a short circuit was the cause, according to a police statement released Tuesday.
Nasir Mahmood Satti, a district police chief, also confirmed that there was no attack.
Police and government officials attended a collective funeral on Tuesday for the officers killed in the blasts.
Associated Press footage from the anti-terrorism facility showed wrecked cars and fallen trees at the site, which also houses a police station and reserve police headquarters.
According to the police, the short circuit in a basement with “grenades and other explosives” was the cause of the explosions.
“It was like all hell broke loose on me,” said 21-year-old Abbas Khan, who parked his car near the police station.
He said a thick cloud of dust and smoke engulfed the entire area, making it difficult to breathe.
The explosion rained munitions on nearby houses and streets.
“Three hundred kilos [660 pounds] of explosives – including anti-tank and anti-personnel mines, artillery shells and mortars – were stored in the basement, alongside improvised explosive devices and suicide vests recovered from terrorists’ custody,” Khalid Sohail, a senior officer in the local anti-terrorism division, told AFP news agency.
Swat district is located in the center of the picturesque Swat Valley, once the stronghold of the Pakistani Taliban. The army carried out a large-scale operation there in 2007 and later claimed to have routed the group’s fighters and restored peace. However, the attacks have continued.
The Pakistani Taliban – also known as Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan or TTP – said their fighters attacked a security checkpoint on the outskirts of Peshawar, the provincial capital, on Monday evening.
There was no confirmation of an attack from the authorities.
The Pakistani Taliban are separate but allied to the Afghan Taliban, who seized power in Afghanistan for the second time in August 2021. The takeover has emboldened the TTP, which has ramped up its attacks in recent months.
The TTP was formed in 2007 when Pakistani nationals fighting alongside the Taliban in Afghanistan splintered to direct attacks against Pakistan. They were in retaliation for the government supporting the US invasion of the neighboring country after the 9/11 attacks in the United States in 2001.