by Jamil Bhatti
ISLAMABAD, Dec. 31 (Xinhua) -- Security situation in Pakistan during the year of 2016 have been improved evidently as the number of terrorist attacks dropped sharply as compared with the terrorist incidents took place in 2015, according to the official statistics from security sources here.
In 2016, terrorists conducted at least 172 terrorist attacks, including bomb blasts and gun attacks, in different areas of Pakistan, which were about 46 percent less than that of 2015 when 322 such incidents took place because of the successful countrywide military operations against the terrorists and their facilitators.
According to the data, at least 600 people, including 423 civilians and 177 personnel of security forces, were killed and over 1,400 others injured in the 172 terrorist attacks. In 2016, the number of killings dropped only by 13 percent as compared with the 2015 when 688 people were killed.
Out of the total number of attacks, 110 attacks were bomb blasts which killed 501 people and left 1,344 others wounded.
Year 2016 witnessed 19 suicide attacks, which are the lowest number of such attacks since 2007, the time when suicide bombing got momentum in Pakistan in reaction to its decision to become a front-line state in war on terror.
The 19 suicide attacks killed 401 people and left 935 others wounded in different areas of the country. In 2016, the number of suicide attacks dropped by only 5 percent as compared with the previous year when 20 suicide blasts took place. However, the number of causalities caused by the suicide attacks in 2016 were 113 percent higher than that of 2015.
The worst incident of the year took place on March 27, 2016, when a suicide bomber ripped through the main entrance of a public park in the country's eastern metropolitan of Lahore, killing 75 people including 29 children and leaving over 340 others injured.
The brutal attack, claimed by a fraction of Pakistani Taliban, drew a strong condemnation from home and abroad, including China, the United States, Russia, India, Turkey, Canada and Britain.
On Aug. 8, the second worst terrorist attack of the year occurred in Quetta and killed 74 people and injured 130 others by attacking a group of people mostly of them lawyers who had gathered in a public hospital to protest against the killing of a senior lawyer who was shot dead by unknown gunmen an hour before a suicide bomber hit the gathering.
Later on, the investigators revealed that it was a well-planned attack by a group of terrorists who first killed the president of the local lawyers' association and then a suicide bomber waited for them to be gathered in the hospital.
On Oct. 24, at least 62 police personnel were killed and 164 others injured as a group of three terrorists stormed a police training college at night in Sariab area, 13 km away from Quetta, provincial capital of Pakistan's southwestern Balochistan province.
In another incident on Nov. 12, at least 52 persons were killed and 102 others injured in an explosion at the shrine of Shah Norani in Khuzdar district of Balochistan. The bomb ripped through the main courtyard of the shrine, located in rough and hilly terrain, when hundreds of people were taking part in a dancing ritual.
A majority of the bomb blasts were triggered with remote control devices that were planted on the roadsides, while all major attacks were claimed by Islamic State (IS) and fractions of Pakistani Taliban.
During the year 2016, Pakistan Air Force and personnel of Pakistan army continued their operations in northwestern tribal areas bordering Afghanistan, while personnel of security forces and counter-terrorism department of police conducted combing and intelligence based operations against terrorists' facilitators across the country, in which at least 896 terrorists were killed and hundreds of others were arrested.
Pakistan have obviously achieved vital successes against the terrorism two and half year after the launch of military operation Zarb-e-Azab, or Sharp Strike, in June 2014 in its northwestern tribal area of North Waziristan bordering Afghanistan, which was once considered as the safe haven for the local and foreign militants.
According to the Inter Services Public Relations (ISPR), the media wing of the Pakistan army, Pakistan military have killed over 9,000 militants, including four commanders, and arrested over 1,000 others in addition to destroying the strong holds of militants, while 587 security personnel were also killed and 2,292 others wounded in the operation Zarb-e-Azb so far.
Pakistan's armed forces have also claimed to have vital success in two consecutive operations launched against the terrorists in another tribal region of Khyber Agency.
The Pakistan army has also taken special measures to monitor the cross-border movement at the 2,430-km Pak-Afghan border to stop the infiltration of militants from Afghanistan, who had run away after the launch of the military operations in Pakistan.
