‘Bomber kills policeman in Pakistan’

One policeman has been killed and six others including four civilians wounded after a bomber hit a police patrol in northwestern Pakistan, police say.

The bomb attack took place at a market in Katalang, 50 kilometers (30 miles) northeast of Peshawar, the capital of restive Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province which borders Afghanistan.

Police shot dead an alleged handler of the suicide bomber, a police official said.

No group has yet claimed responsibility for the bombing, but Taliban militants in the past have carried out several bombings in the region.

On Friday, a bomb blast in Pakistan’s northwestern city of Peshawar claimed the lives of twelve people and injured a dozen others.

Thousands of Pakistanis have lost their lives in bombings and other militant attacks since October 2001, when Pakistan joined an alliance with the United States in its so-called war on terror.

Since late 2009, there has been a surge in militant attacks in Pakistan and thousands more have been displaced by the wave of violence and militancy sweeping across the country.