Islamabad - At least 24 Islamist militants and four tribal
policemen were killed in overnight airstrikes in Pakistan's
north-western region near Afghanistan, officials said on Friday.
Pakistani jet aircraft and helicopter gunships targeted suspected
Taliban positions Thursday in Orakzai, a relatively peaceful district
in the country's lawless tribal region littered with Taliban
sanctuaries.
The raids flattened several militant hideouts in the Ferozkhel and
Ghiljo areas, killing at least 24 insurgents, a security official
said on condition of anonymity.
The death toll could not be verified independently, but The News
daily on Friday cited a Taliban spokesman as confirming that the
rebels suffered 18 casualties.
Elsewhere in the troubled region, four policemen were killed late
Thursday when insurgents attacked a security checkpoint near Khar,
the main town of Bajaur tribal district on the Afghan border, another
security official said.
A major offensive in Bajaur last year left more than 1,500
militants dead.
The district was described as a hub of al-Qaeda and Taliban
fighters, who plotted and launched deadly attacks on US and NATO
troops in Afghanistan.
The United States has welcomed Pakistan's ongoing operations
against the militants across the north-west, as it places the country
at the centre of its strategy to turn the tide against the Afghan
Taliban.
Pakistani forces have nearly concluded their two-month operation
in the Swat valley and its neighbouring areas, and are now gearing up
for an offensive against top Taliban commander Baitullah Mehsud and
his network in South Waziristan district.
Mehsud, who carries a 5-million-US-dollar bounty on his head for
being a key al-Qaeda facilitator, is blamed for a spate of terrorist
attacks since 2007 which have killed more than 2,000 people, mostly
civilians.
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