Pak hunts al Qaeda fighters wounded in strike
Islamabad, Jan 17: Pakistani security forces were hunting a handful of al Qaeda fighters today believed to have been wounded in an air strike close to the Afghan border a day earlier, army spokesman Major General Shaukat Sultan said.
The attack by rocket-firing helicopter gunships on Zamzola village, in the remote mountains of South Waziristan, killed up to 20 militants, according to intelligence officials.
''We had information that five or six foreigners with al Qaeda links were present there, and that's why we carried out the attack,'' Sultan said, adding that he could not give the names.
''We are pursuing the wounded persons,'' he said.
The timing of the attack, coinciding with a visit by U S Defense Secretary Robert Gates to Afghanistan, raised speculation Pakistan was seeking to deflect U S criticism that it was not doing enough to curb Taliban operating from its territory.
An intelligence official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said several wounded, believed to be Arabs, were said to have been taken to private hospitals and clinics in Miranshah and Mir Ali, two towns in North Waziristan.
Actual casualty figures are hazy, because the army did not have troops on the ground at Zamzola. Information received from villagers on Tuesday suggested eight bodies had been found, and 10 were wounded, according to Sultan.
But intelligence officials believed up to 20 militants were killed.
Twenty-five to 30 militants were believed to have been in the compounds at the time of the attack, though tribesmen, according to The News daily, say the only people there were locals and Afghan nomads.
Intelligence officials, however, maintain fighters loyal to a pro-Taliban commander, Baitullah Mehsud, were based there.
The Waziristan tribal agencies are regarded as hotbeds of support for the Taliban and al Qaeda, and Pakistan has lost hundreds of troops in campaigns to oust the militants over the past three years.
The government, in an effort to stop a wider conflict engulfing the tribal lands, signed a peace deal with the militants in South Waziristan in February, 2005, and another with tribal elders in North Waziristan in September last year.
Critics say the the pacts risked creating sanctuaries for the militants, and U S officials say there has been a huge increase in the number of cross-border attacks since the accords were signed.
The militants set up a parallel administration in South Waziristan since the treaty, and tribesmen told Reuters that they are actively recruiting men and boys to fight in Afghanistan or to become suicide bombers.
REUTERS
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