A house explosion kills two children in a former Pakistani Taliban stronghold

PESHAWAR, Pakistan (AP) — A powerful explosion ripped through a house in a former Pakistani Taliban stronghold Thursday, killing at least two children and wounding several others, police said.

Police are still investigating what caused the blast, including whether someone handled explosives to make a bomb, local police chief Irfan Khan said.

The blast occurred in Mir Ali, a city in the northwestern province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, which borders Afghanistan and where Pakistani Taliban and other insurgents often attack security forces with suicide bombings and other violence.

Elsewhere in the province, a suicide bomber on a motorcycle prematurely detonated an explosive on a deserted road in Charsadda district on Thursday, killing himself but harming no one else, police said.

Local police official Masood Khan said the intended target was unclear and bomb disposal experts and police were still investigating whether the man was carrying the explosives or if they were attached to his motorcycle.

The Pakistani Taliban, known as Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, are separate from the Afghan Taliban but have been emboldened by the group’s 2021 takeover of Afghanistan.