Pakistani police kill vendor suspecting him of being bomber

FILE - In this June 15, 2016 file photo, a Pakistan army soldier stands guard in Pakistani tribal area of Khyber, near Torkham border post between Pakistan and Afghanistan. Pakistan's cabinet on Thursday, March 2, 2017, approved a set of reforms that will bring the tribal regions under government control, an aide to Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's said. (AP Photo/Muhammad Sajjad, File) (The Associated Press)

Pakistani police have shot and killed a vendor they suspected of being a suicide bomber in a northwestern city.

Officer Mumtaz Khan says the vendor was riding a bicycle and didn't stop at a checkpoint outside a courthouse in Mardan city.

He says the police first rammed a vehicle into the bicycle when the vendor didn't listen to warning shouts and shot him when he tried to run away.

Khan says the man died later, and that no explosives or weapons were found.

Pakistani police have been on high alert after a recent string of suicide bombings that have killed more than 125 people, the latest of them inside a court building in another northwestern city.

Pakistani Taliban-linked militants and the Islamic State group have claimed the brazen attacks.