Suicide car bomber kills five in Pakistan

PESHAWAR, Pakistan, Jan 22 (Reuters) A rare suicide car bomb attack in North Waziristan killed four Pakistani soldiers and a woman passer-by today, raising fears that government peace deals in the pro-Taliban region were disintegrating.

In addition to the deaths, a military spokesman said nine soldiers had been wounded, some critically, when the car rammed an army convoy at Khajori checkpost, near the town of Mir Ali, where Taliban and al Qaeda fighters have been active in the past.

''A white-coloured car hit the convoy and it appears to be a suicide attack,'' spokesman Major-General Shaukat Sultan told Reuters.

He said three soldiers had been killed outright and a fourth died in hospital. A local security official said a woman bystander had also died.

It was uncertain how many people were in the suicide car.

No one immediately claimed responsibility.

The suicide attack came less than a week after a Pakistani air strike on a suspected Taliban and al Qaeda base in neighbouring South Waziristan, raising the possibility that it was an act of revenge.

That strike killed up to 20 militants, intelligence officials said. Villagers said only the bodies of eight wood-cutters had been found.

Tensions have been running high since then in Waziristan, which borders Afghanistan, and tribesmen in the area expected a breakdown in peace accords worked out by the government with militants and tribal elders.

SUICIDE ATTACKS RARE Hundreds of people have been killed since late 2003 in Waziristan in clashes between security forces and militants.

Suicide attacks on the army, however, are extremely rare, although the Taliban regularly uses the tactic across the border against Afghan, US, and NATO-led forces.

Witnesses said people were fleeing their homes in parts of South Waziristan amid fears of renewed fighting.

Residents said militants had taken up positions on high ground near army posts in the Khaisor, Makeen and Laddah areas.

''This time, God forbid, if clashes break out, then no one can stop them. We can only pray for a lasting peace,'' Maulana Saleh Shah, a national senator from South Waziristan, told Reuters.

The government signed a peace accord with militants in North Waziristan last September, after a similar deal was struck in South Waziristan in February 2005.

US officials say cross-border incursions into Afghanistan by Taliban fighters based in Pakistan increased significantly after the North Waziristan accord, although the tribal area itself has been relatively calm.

Last November, a suicide bomber killed 42 army recruits in Dargai in the North West Frontier Province, in revenge for another army helicopter attack.

That strike killed over 80 men and boys at a madrasa or religious school run by a pro-Taliban cleric in the Bajaur tribal region.

The two Waziristans, which lie at the southern end of Pakistan's tribal belt, and the northerly Bajaur tribal region pose the greatest security threat among Pakistan's seven Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA).

The southwestern province of Baluchistan is said to be another region where Taliban support is high.

REUTERS SP HS1900