A car bomb ripped through a police compound in a northwestern Pakistani city on Tuesday, killing 14 women and children and three officers, the latest in a string of attacks.

The dead included the wives and children of police officers, said Khalid Omarzai, the city's top government official.

Another 94 people were wounded, he said, adding that they had been taken to hospitals after rescuers cleared rubble of more than two dozen collapsed houses and shops.

The complex in the garrison city of Kohat houses officers' homes, a training facility and a commercial area.

'This city is a war zone. We would always expect such attacks.'— Khalid Omarzai, local official

Officer Mohammad Arif said there was a huge explosion in the residential area of the compound soon after the evening breaking of the daily fast during Ramadan, the Islamic holy month. Power to the area was cut, forcing emergency workers to search for victims in the dark, he said.

"There was a massive blast and due to the darkness it is not yet known what the extent of damage and loss of life is," Arif said.

Kohat, the major town on the road between the provincial capital of Peshawar and several tribal areas, has been the scene of several militant attacks this year. In April, two burka-clad suicide bombers attacked refugees lined up to register for food and other relief supplies in the district, killing 41 people and wounding dozens more.

"This city is a war zone," said Khalid Omarzai, a top local official. "We would always expect such attacks."

The Pakistani Taliban have claimed responsibility for recent attacks across the nation aimed at destabilizing the country and weakening a civilian government already struggling with a massive flooding that has displaced millions and caused widespread destruction.

The deadliest attacks have targeted minority Shia Muslims. A suicide bombing killed at least 43 Shia Muslims at a procession in the southwestern city of Quetta on Friday. Two days earlier, a triple suicide attack killed 35 people at a Shiite ceremony in the eastern city of Lahore.

On Monday, a Taliban suicide bomber detonated a car in an alley behind a police station in a strategically important town in northwestern Pakistan, killing at least 17 police and civilians in an explosion that shattered the station and neighbouring homes.

About 40 people were wounded in the attack in Lakki Marwat, which sits on the main road between Punjab province, Pakistan's largest and most prosperous, and the North and South Waziristan tribal regions.