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  (Photo: Reuters / Bob Strong)
  U.S. Army Lt Col David Flynn and Col Patrick Frank lead soldiers as they walk through the former Taliban-held village of Charqolba Olya in the Arghandab Valley, north of Kandahar April 8, 2011.

Officials confirmed that 21 policemen were shot and killed in Pakistan early Sunday. The men had previously been kidnapped by members of the Taliban and were being held hostage; two men managed to escape and get help for their colleagues.

In total, 23 policemen were kidnapped in an early-morning raid on Thursday by militants with "rocket-propelled grenades and automatic weapons," the Associated Press reported. They then allegedly lined all of the men up and gunned them down.

Thankfully, two men were able to escape and get help for their colleagues, but it was sadly too late.

Right now officials believe members of the Pakistani Taliban who have been waging war against the government for months led the attack. The Pakistani Taliban has taken refuge in the Afghanistan border, making it all the more difficult for officials to keep track of and deal with the Taliban's attacks. The bodies of the officers were found in the Jabai area of Frontier Region Peshawar, which is right in the heart of the troubled region.

Before the discovery of the bodies, officials were forced to deal with another attack on Saturday. This time, the explosion of a passenger bus rippled through a terminal in Karachi; six people were killed and 52 were wounded.

Police believe that attack was also due to Taliban militants, though this time a different group that has reportedly "fled United States drone attacks and Pakistani Army operations," AP noted.

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The Pakistani Taliban has always been brazen in its attacks, but more recently stepped them up perhaps to bring more attention to its dissatisfaction with the U.S. and Pakistan's government.

In October, one of the most brutal attacks took place against a young child named Malala Yousafzai, who spoke out about her desire for education and rights. She was specifically targeted by the Taliban, who boarded a bus and shot her in the head. Yousafzai was hospitalized, but survived the attack.