HANGU: Six Pakistan security personnel were killed in an overnight siege by 50 militants on a Hungarian-owned oil and gas exploration site here on Tuesday (23rd of May, 2023).

Pakistan has seen an increase in militancy since the Taliban returned to power in neighboring Afghanistan in 2021, with attacks mostly targeting security forces and foreign interests accused of exploitation.

Fighters attacked a site owned by the Budapest-headquartered MOL Group around midnight in the Hangu district of KP.

They were armed with light and heavy weapons and fired mortar shells, killing six security personnel at the main entrance to the remote site near the Afghan border.

The dead included four members of paramilitary police assistance force the Frontier Constabulary and two Pakistani private security guards for the firm.

The exchange of fire continued for more than an hour. Police forced the militants to flee.

The MOL Group has operated a Pakistan subsidiary since 1999 and employs 400 people in the country..

“We are assessing the information,” a spokesman for the Hungarian Embassy in Islamabad said, adding that no diplomatic action was planned.

The MOL Group did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The attackers came from the nearby North Waziristan district, which borders Afghanistan and has historically been a hive of militancy.

During America’s post-9/11 invasion of Afghanistan the area was heavily targeted by drone strikes and an Islamabad military offensive to rout Islamist fighters.

Though no group has claimed responsibility, it has been insinuated by the authorities that the attack was carried out by TTP (that was formed in 2007 by militants who splintered off from the Afghan Taliban to focus their fight on Islamabad for supporting America’s invasion).

AFP/APP

Newspakistan.tv