Gunmen kill two Pakistani officials, guard in ambush

MIRANSHAH, Pakistan, Feb 1 (Reuters) Gunmen killed two Pakistani government officials and a guard in an ambush today in a tribal region near the Afghan border where security forces are battling militants, a security official said.

No one claimed responsibility for the attack in the North Waziristan region, though militants linked to al Qaeda and the Taliban have been blamed for numerous such incidents in the past.

The district-level officials were travelling in a car with a guard and three other people when gunmen in a car ambushed them near the town of Mir Ali, a security official said.

Police returned fire, shattering windows in the gunmen's car but they managed to escape, said the security official, who declined to be identified. It was not known if any of the attackers were wounded or killed.

Pakistan's semi-autonomous tribal belt on the Afghan border is notorious for violent feuds between members of ethnic Pashtun tribes.

But numerous government officials and pro-government tribal leaders have been killed in the area since security forces launched a hunt for militants in late 2003 as part of Pakistan's efforts in the US-led war on terrorism.

The government struck a peace pact in the region in September aimed at ending attacks on security forces and militant raids into Afghanistan but intermittent violence has continued.

Tension has risen since a Pakistani air strike on a militant camp last month that killed up to 20 people.

There has been speculation that three suicide bomb attacks that killed nearly 20 people over the past week -- in the capital, Islamabad, and in two northwestern towns -- might have been revenge for the air strike on the militant camp.

A government official in the southern city of Karachi said security agencies had arrested at least a dozen suspected militants in the south over recent days but it was too early to say if they were linked to the blasts.

REUTERS AKJ BD1907