KHAR, Pakistan: A mortar struck a home and killed two children and their mother in a northwestern Pakistani region where security forces are carrying out a “targeted operation ” against the Pakistani Taliban, residents and a hospital official said Wednesday.

It was not immediately clear who was responsible for the overnight civilian casualties in Mamund, a town in the Bajaur district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province bordering Afghanistan.

Naseeb Gul, a medical doctor at a local hospital, said the dead were two children and their mother. Two people were also wounded Tuesday when another mortar hit their home, he said.

Angered by the deaths, hundreds of demonstrators were refusing to bury the bodies and demanding an investigation, according to local villager Mohammad Khalid.

There was no immediate comment from the government or the military.

The latest development came days after security forces launched an offensive in Bajaur to target militant hideouts. The provincial government said the “targeted operation” was launched after tribal elders failed to evict insurgents from the region.

Government officials said the ongoing offensive against the Pakistani Taliban has displaced 25,000 families or an estimated 100,000 people in Bajaur, where authorities eased a curfew on Wednesday, allowing residents to buy essential items.

Thousands of displaced people are currently residing in government buildings, and many other have gone to other safer areas to live with relatives.

The Bajaur offensive is the second operation there since 2009, when the military launched a large-scale campaign against the Pakistani Taliban, also known as Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan, or TTP. The TTP is a separate but a close ally of the Afghan Taliban, who seized power in Afghanistan in August 2021.

Many TTP leaders and fighters have found sanctuary in Afghanistan since the Taliban takeover and have been living there openly. Some have crossed the border back into Bajaur to carry out attacks.

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s provincial governments in Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) have saved billions of rupees and unlocked significant new resources for development under a landmark British-backed governance program that concluded this year, the British High Commission said on Wednesday.

The UK’s Sub-National Governance Program, which ran from 2019 to 2025, worked with provincial authorities to improve planning, budgeting and revenue mobilization.

According to the High Commission, the program unlocked over £1.9 billion ($2.41 billion) in public finance, allowing savings to be reinvested into other public services.

In Punjab, a comprehensive pensions reform plan was introduced, shifting to a contributory scheme with both employer and employee payments, expected to save the government of Punjab Rs 2.7 trillion. ($9.72 billion) over the next 30 years. In KP, the program supported an overhaul of waste management systems, introducing sustainable door-to-door collection now being scaled up across the province.

“This program shows what is possible when strong partnerships come together to support long-term reform, changing people’s lives,” British High Commission Development Director Sam Waldock said.

“We’ve strengthened institutions, improved service delivery, and helped Pakistan unlock more of its resources to finance its own development. That has led to direct improvements to the day to day lives of millions — from helping people to access essential cash assistance, to creating waste management systems which makes their surroundings cleaner and more hygienic.”

The statement said the reforms also strengthened social protection systems in Punjab by collecting social and economic data for 35 million residents, enabling the government to better target urgent cash assistance and food subsidies.

The program helped design and roll out initiatives such as Ba-Himmat Buzurg, which offers financial assistance to elderly people with no source of income, and the Himmat Card, which provides financial support for people with disabilities.

The UK’s work on governance reform in Pakistan will now continue under the new National Governance Program, in collaboration with the UN Development Program, with a focus on sustained institutional reform and improved public financial management, including further provincial pension reforms.

The UK is one of Pakistan’s largest bilateral development partners, with cooperation spanning education, health, climate resilience, governance reform and trade. The UK is also home to one of the largest Pakistani diasporas, estimated at over 1.6 million people, who contribute significantly to remittances, business and cultural links.

In 2024, total trade in goods and services between the UK and Pakistan was £4.7 billion ($5.97 billion), up 7.3 percent from the previous year.