ISLAMABAD -- A suicide bomber struck outside the gates of a district court in Islamabad on Tuesday, detonating his explosives next to a police car and killing 12 people, Pakistan's interior minister said, the latest in an uptick in violence across the country.

A breakaway faction of the Pakistani Taliban, the Jamaat-ul-Ahrar group, claimed responsibility for the attack, which also injured 27 people, in messages to reporters from the group's leader, Omar Mukkaram Khurasani. However, an influential commander within the group, Sarbakaf Mohmand, also sent messages disavowing any claim to the attack.

The group quit the Pakistani Taliban, or TTP, after the head of Jamaat-ul-Ahrar was killed in a blast in Afghanistan in 2022. Though some members recently rejoined the TTP, others keep their dist

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