BackSuspected US missile strike kills militants in Pakistan
Suspected US missile strike kills militants in Pakistan
PremiumIslamabad: A suspected US missile strike killed eight people in northwestern Pakistan on Friday and fighting in another militant stronghold near the Afghan border killed dozens more, officials said.
Two intelligence officials said that missiles struck a home near Miran Shah, the main town in the North Waziristan tribal region, before dawn.
The officials said the identity of the eight people killed and five others who were injured was not immediately clear.
American forces in Afghanistan are stepping up their efforts to hit Taliban and Al-Qaeda militants in what they describe as safe havens in Pakistan’s wild border regions, despite stiff protests from Islamabad.
With the insurgency in Afghanistan intensifying, US President George W Bush secretly approved more aggressive cross-border operations in July, current and former American officials have said.
The intelligence officials said agents in South Waziristan had told them about the latest attack. A military official also said he had received reports of a missile strike. He had no information on casualties.
The three officials asked for anonymity because they are not authorized to speak on the record to media.
North Waziristan is part of a belt of tribally governed territory where Pakistan’s government has little control. The frontier region is considered the most likely hiding place for Osama bin Laden and Al-Qaeda No.2 Ayman al-Zawahri.
Both the US military and the CIA operate drone aircraft armed with missiles of the type believed to have killed two senior al-Qaida commanders in Pakistani territory earlier this year.
Pakistani officials warn that the strikes will deepen anti-American sentiment in the country and wreck efforts to win over moderate tribal leaders and bring economic development to the impoverished border region.
Authorities negotiated a peace deal with tribes in North Waziristan earlier this year. Similar efforts have failed or broken down on other parts of the northwest.
On Friday, army spokesman Maj. Murad Khan said 32 militants and 2 soldiers had died in the previous 24 hours in the Bajur region. Iqbal Khattak, a local government official, put the total for the 24-hour period higher, saying about 60 militants have died.
Officials say hundreds of militants have died there in a weeks-long offensive into Bajur. An estimated 500,000 people have fled their homes. Officials acknowledge that civilian have been killed and villages badly damaged in the fighting.
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