18 Militants Killed in North Waziristan and Mastung as Forces Recover Weapons Cache

Security forces killed 18 militants in two separate operations announced October 7 and 8 — 13 in North Waziristan, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, and five in Mastung, Balochistan — in the latest round of a counter-militancy campaign that has run at a near-weekly tempo across both provinces this year.

The North Waziristan operation

State media, citing security sources, said forces tracked the movements and hideouts of a group in North Waziristan and surrounding areas before launching an intelligence-based operation (IBO) that killed 13 militants. Those killed were identified as belonging to Fitna al-Khawarij, the designation Pakistani state communications now use instead of naming the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) directly. The operation was carried out under the Azm-e-Istehkam framework, the government's umbrella counter-terrorism strategy for coordinating military, paramilitary and civilian action, chiefly in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

The Mastung operation

The second operation struck the Siapush and Killi Gashtari areas of Mastung district in Balochistan, where forces killed five militants described as belonging to Fitna al-Hindustan — the state's term for Baloch separatist groups it says are backed by India. A large quantity of weapons and ammunition was recovered from the site, and security sources said clearance and search operations were continuing in the area to locate any remaining militants. The operation falls under Radd-ul-Fitna 3, the current phase of the military's counter-insurgency campaign in the province.

Part of a pattern, not an isolated strike

Both provinces have absorbed a steady drumbeat of similar operations this year. Earlier in October, security forces killed eight terrorists, including three commanders, in a Dera Ismail Khan operation, which this desk covered at the time, and a separate pair of Balochistan operations in Sherani and Kachhi killed 13 militants just days before that, as we also reported. The Center for Research and Security Studies' latest quarterly tally found violence-related fatalities surged 83 percent in the third quarter of 2026 compared with the same period a year earlier, a report this desk covered in detail — a trend these near-weekly operations are a direct response to, even as the fatality numbers keep climbing rather than falling.

The political backdrop in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa

The North Waziristan operation lands in the middle of an unresolved fight over who actually controls counter-terrorism policy in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. The federal government and KP's PTI administration have spent recent weeks clashing over a possible governor's rule, driven partly by disagreement over the province's security response, a dispute this desk has tracked closely. Operations like this one proceed regardless of that standoff, carried out by federal security forces operating inside a province whose own chief minister has publicly rejected the military operation plan the Centre has pushed, as we reported last week.

What's unverified, and what comes next

As with most ISPR-linked statements of this kind, the casualty figures come from security sources and state media rather than independent verification, and there has been no public claim of responsibility or rebuttal from either the TTP or Baloch separatist groups as of this writing. The weapons cache recovered in Mastung, if confirmed in detail, would mirror a pattern ISPR statements have increasingly emphasised this year — using recovered arms and foreign currency to support claims that militant networks in both provinces are externally supplied. Clearance operations in both districts were ongoing at the time of writing, and officials have given no indication the operational tempo will slow.

Build Better Pakistan's Security Desk covers militancy, counter-terrorism operations and the security situation along Pakistan's western border.