PESHAWAR, Pakistan (AP) — The death toll from an overnight deadly militant attack on a police post in northwestern Pakistan rose to 11 early Thursday, police and a government official said.
Security forces killed 15 militants in an hourlong gunbattle after they targeted the Khazina police post in Hangu district in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, which borders Afghanistan, police official Irfan Khan said.
No group immediately claimed responsibility for the assault. Suspicion is likely to fall on the Pakistani Taliban, known as Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, or TTP, which has stepped up attacks on Pakistani security forces in the region in recent months.
Among those killed was Diyar Khan, a senior police officer who led reinforcements to the scene, according to a provincial police statement. More than two dozen police officers were also wounded in the attack.
Police said the militants attacked the police post with heavy weapons. Reinforcements dispatched to the scene were ambushed en route, damaging an armored personnel carrier before officers fought back, according to the statement.
Pakistan has witnessed a surge in militant violence in recent years, much of it blamed on the TTP, a separate group but a close ally of the Afghan Taliban, who returned to power in neighboring Afghanistan in 2021. Islamabad has repeatedly accused Afghanistan’s Taliban government of providing sanctuary to TTP militants, an allegation Kabul denies.
People transport a man, who was inured in the militant attack on a police post in Hangu district, upon arrival at a hospital in Peshawar, Pakistan, Thursday, July 30, 2026. (AP Photo/Arif Khan)
People transport a man, who was inured in the militant attack on a police post in Hangu district, upon arrival at a hospital in Peshawar, Pakistan, Thursday, July 30, 2026. (AP Photo/Arif Khan)
LEGE-CAP FERRET, France (AP) — Higher humidity, cooler temperatures and a forecast for rain raised hopes of relief Thursday for a parched portion of southwestern France engulfed by wildfires that have charred an area four times the size of Paris in recent weeks.
With moisture moving in from the Atlantic coast, national weather service Meteo France forecast light rain in the town of Lege-Cap Ferret, on a peninsula that's been a leading edge of the devastated region.
Local officials reported a “rather calm" night, with a fire that has not grown beyond the 42,000 hectares (about 162 sq. miles) already affected. Fire crews remained at “total mobilization” with 2,200 firefighters and over 20 aircraft.
Rain fell early Thursday in the city of Bordeaux to the east. But there were no early signs of enough rainfall in the hardest-hit areas that could douse the flames or dampen the sandy ground and brushy undergrowth of pine forests that have fueled the inferno.
Sophie Brocas, the prefect for the Gironde region, expressed some optimism that lower temperatures could help.
“If that's confirmed, we could foresee a return to a more normal life for residents, but also for businesses that need to work,” she told reporters late Wednesday.
Humidity reached 80% overnight but was expected to drop by midday, authorities said. Some rainfall was expected along the coast that “could reach the fire zone,” Gironde officials said in a morning note.
Temperatures that peaked around 40 Celsius (104 Fahrenheit) a day earlier were set to drop Thursday, topping out at 27 C (80 F) along the coast. An “orange” heat wave alert — the second-highest level after “red” — was lifted shortly before dawn.
The fires in the Bordeaux wine-growing, forested and tourism-heavy region are among the blazes that have swept across pockets of southern Europe in recent weeks, including Spain and Greece.
On Thursday, firefighters were tackling multiple forest fires in four of Turkey’s western provinces, the state-run Anadolu news agency reported.
Blazes in touristic Mugla and Antalya and elsewhere raged overnight as hot weather and strong winds gripped the region. Residents were evacuated as teams with firefighting planes and helicopters battled the fires.
A day earlier, authorities in neighboring Greece said three firefighters had died on the island on Crete, as the wildfire emergency stretched from the Atlantic coast to the eastern Mediterranean.
At the peak of the evacuations, a third of a million people were driven from homes and vacation sites in France and Spain.
Flames burn an olive tree during a wildfire in the Rethymno region on the southern Greek island of Crete, Wednesday, July 29, 2026, where two firefighters died while battling the blaze. (AP Photo/Giannis Angelakis)
Embers smolder inside an olive tree during a wildfire in the Rethymno region on the southern Greek island of Crete, Wednesday, July 29, 2026, where two firefighters died while battling the blaze. (AP Photo/Giannis Angelakis)
A fire burns in the forest near Blagon, during wildfires in southwestern France, Wednesday, July 29, 2026. (AP Photo/Emma Da Silva)
A firefighter lays on the ground after working to extinguish a fire in the forest near Blagon, during wildfires in southwestern France, Wednesday, July 29, 2026. (AP Photo/Emma Da Silva)
A smoke cloud rises as firefighters work to extinguish a fire in the forest near Blagon, during wildfires in southwestern France, Wednesday, July 29, 2026. (AP Photo/Emma Da Silva)
