An explosive-laden car rammed into a Pakistani military convoy on Saturday in a town in North Waziristan district, killing at least 13 soldiers, Reuters reported citing sources.

Four Pakistani intelligence officials and a senior local administrator told Reuters that the convoy was attacked in Mir Ali area of North Waziristan district.

Around 10 other soldiers were wounded, some critically, and they were being airlifted to a military hospital, the sources said.

“It was huge, a big bang,” said the local administrator, adding that residents of the town could see a large amount of smoke billowing from the scene from a great distance.

One resident said that the explosion rattled the windowpanes of nearby houses, and caused some roofs to collapse.

No one has so far claimed responsibility.

The Pakistani military did not respond to a Reuters request for a comment.

The lawless district which sits next to Afghanistan has long served as a safe haven for different militant groups/

Islamabad says the militants run training camps in Afghanistan to launch attacks inside Pakistan, a charge Kabul denies, saying the militancy is Pakistan’s domestic issue.

Pakistani Taliban also known as Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), an umbrella group of several militant groups, has long been waging a war against Pakistan in a bid to overthrow the government and replace it with its own Islamic system of governance.

The Pakistani military, which has launched several offensives against the militants, has mostly been their prime target.

Mourners dressed in black lined streets in Iran’s capital Tehran at a funeral on Saturday for top military commanders, nuclear scientists and some of the civilians killed during this month’s war with Israel.

At least 16 scientists and 10 senior commanders were among those mourned at the funeral, according to state media, including armed forces chief Major General Mohammad Bagheri, Revolutionary Guards commander General Hossein Salami, and Guards Aerospace Force chief General Amir Ali Hajizadeh, Reuters reported.

Their coffins were driven into Tehran’s Azadi Square adorned with their pictures as well as rose petals and flowers, as crowds waved Iranian flags. State-run Press TV showed an image of ballistic missiles on display.

State TV said the funeral, dubbed the “funeral procession of the Martyrs of Power”, was held for a total of 60 people killed in the war, including four women and four children.

Attending the funeral were President Masoud Pezeshkian and other senior figures including Ali Shamkhani, who was seriously wounded during the conflict and is an adviser to Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Bagheri, Salami and Hajizadeh were killed on June 13, the first day of the war.

Israel, the only Middle Eastern country widely believed to have nuclear weapons, said its war against regional rival Iran aimed to prevent Tehran from developing its own nuclear weapons.

Iran denies having a nuclear weapons program. The U.N. nuclear watchdog, which carries out inspections in Iran, has said it has “no credible indication” of an active, coordinated weapons programme in Iran.

A senior Israeli military official said on Friday that Israel had killed more than 30 senior security officials and 11 senior nuclear scientists during the war.

According to Iranian health ministry figures, 610 people were killed on the Iranian side in the 12-day war, 13 of them children and 49 women, before a ceasefire went into effect on Tuesday. More than 4,700 were injured.

Activist news agency HRANA put the number of killed at 974, including 387 civilians.

Israel’s health ministry said 28 were killed in Israel and 3,238 injured.

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Pakistan Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif held a call on Thursday in which they discussed promoting “a durable peace between Israel and Iran,” the State Department said in a statement.

President Donald Trump, earlier this week, announced a ceasefire between U.S. ally Israel and its regional rival Iran to halt a war that began on June 13 when Israel attacked Iran, Reuters reported. 

Trump met Pakistan’s army chief Field Marshal Asim Munir at the White House last week where they discussed Iran, which Trump said Pakistan knew about better than most other countries.

A section of Pakistan’s embassy in Washington represents Iran’s interests in the United States, as Tehran does not have diplomatic relations with the U.S.

“The two leaders acknowledged the importance of working together to promote a durable peace between Israel and Iran,” the U.S. State Department said in a statement.

“Secretary Rubio emphasized Iran can never develop or acquire a nuclear weapon.”

The Israel-Iran conflict had raised alarms in a region that was already on edge since the start of Israel’s war in Gaza in October 2023.

The U.S. struck Iran’s nuclear sites over the last weekend and Iran targeted a U.S. base in Qatar on Monday in retaliation, before Trump announced an Israel-Iran ceasefire.

Israel is the only Middle Eastern country widely believed to have nuclear weapons and said its war against Iran aimed to prevent Tehran from developing its own nuclear weapons. Iran is a party to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty while Israel is not.

Pakistan condemned Israeli and U.S. strikes on Iran even as it said earlier this month it was nominating Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize for his role in bringing a four-day India-Pakistan conflict to an end last month.