Eleven police killed in ambush on gold-mining raid in Pakistan's Kohat

Eleven police officers were killed and 12 injured when gunmen ambushed a police team heading to raid illegal gold mining in the Darbokach / Jalandhar Banda area between Kohat and Karak in Pakistan's Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province on Wednesday (11 November). The attackers opened fire from hilltops and set five police vehicles ablaze; an exchange of fire and a pursuit were still under way, and with 12 officers in hospital, the death toll could still rise.

Deputy superintendent among the dead

Kohat police spokesperson Muhammad Nauman Zeb confirmed the dead included Gambat Deputy Superintendent of Police Haider Zaman and Sub-Inspector Mukhtiar. The Rescue 1122 emergency service confirmed the toll had reached 11, and the 12 injured were taken to hospitals in Kohat, among them Gumbat station house officer Ayaz Afridi. The District Headquarters Teaching Hospital in Kohat declared an emergency.

Governor condemns attack; police link assailants to illegal mining

Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Governor Faisal Karim Kundi condemned the attack, sought a detailed report from police and directed that those involved be brought to justice. Provincial information adviser Samar Haroon Bilour said the injured should receive the best possible medical care. Police described the attackers as militants belonging to Fitna al-Khawarij — the term Pakistani officials use for the banned Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan — along with "criminal elements", and said illegal gold mining in the area had continued because of a nexus between the two. That description is the police's account, not an independent finding; by Wednesday evening no group had claimed the attack and the number of attackers had not been independently established. Police said several militants were killed in the exchange of fire, while The Express Tribune gave no militant casualty figure.

Attacks on police remain frequent

It is the latest in a series of attacks on police in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. On 18 September, a blast and armed assault at Kohat's Old Police Lines killed 23 people, including 15 police officers, and wounded more than 50. On 8 October, Station House Officer Daud Khan and his gunman, Farhad, were killed when gunmen opened fire on a patrol near the Karak-Kohat boundary. On 28 September, three traffic police officers were killed in Tank district, and on 25 September a Counter-Terrorism Department constable, Muhammad Afaq, was killed during an operation in Peshawar's Garhi Sherdad area. The Armed Conflict Location & Event Data project counted 2,425 attacks in Pakistan in 2025, nearly four times the 658 recorded in 2022. Two security reports presented to the federal cabinet in October found that terrorist incidents in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa had risen by 195 per cent between March 2024 and September 2026, and that 73 per cent of attacks recorded in the province during 2026 had targeted police and security personnel.

Sources: Reuters, The Express Tribune, Geo News, Anadolu Agency.

Update, evening of 11 November

Police later said in a statement that officers killed 18 attackers in the exchange of fire. The police toll stands at 10 officers killed, which still differs from the Rescue 1122 figure of 11 and has not been reconciled. On the attackers' identity, police described them as members of the banned Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan; the monitoring group Terror Monitor reported that the Pakistani Taliban later issued a statement claiming the attack, but other reports said no group had claimed it as of Wednesday evening, so the claim awaits independent verification. The pursuit of the attackers is continuing.