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US missile kills eight

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Wed, 08 Jul 2009 15:11

A second US missile strike in as many days hit a Pakistani Taliban compound on Wednesday, killing eight in the tribal stronghold of militant chief Baitullah Mehsud, officials said.

Six missiles fired from an unmanned drone aircraft slammed into a training centre for Islamist extremists in South Waziristan about 35 kilometres northeast of the main town Wana, and near the site of Tuesday's strike.

Pakistani fighter jets have also been pummelling Mehsud's hideouts in recent weeks, with the military vowing to hunt down the warlord's militant network in the remote northwest region known as a base for Taliban and al-Qaeda rebels.

"There was a US missile strike on a Taliban compound in Karwan Manza area of South Waziristan," said a security official in Pakistan's northwest, adding that the strike took place in the early hours of Wednesday.

Another local security official said: "I can confirm that only eight militants have been killed in the missile strike."

That toll was confirmed by another official in the area, who also requested anonymity because he was not authorised to speak to the media about the controversial strikes in an area largely outside government control.

It was not immediately clear whether any high-value targets were killed.

"Up to six missiles were fired by the US drones... The compound in a hilly area was being used by Taliban as their training centre and a meeting place," the official said.

On Tuesday, a US missile strike killed 16 foreign and local militants in a nearby mountain stronghold of Mehsud, who has been described by the US State Department as a key al-Qaeda facilitator in Pakistan's tribal belt.

Washington alleges Islamist fighters hide out in the mountains near the Afghan border, plotting attacks on Western targets and crossing the porous frontier to attack foreign troops based in Afghanistan.

Mehsud has a $5-million reward on his head offered by the United States, and a bounty of $615 000 in Pakistan for allegedly masterminding multiple deadly bombings in the last two years.

About 2000 people have died

About 2000 people have died in Islamist bombings across the country since July 2007, when government forces besieged a radical mosque in Islamabad.

In the latest attack, a bomb blast on Wednesday killed one man and injured five others including three police officers in the city of Peshawar, which has been hit by a wave of Taliban-linked violence.

Pakistani troops have been pressing a two-month battle to dislodge Taliban insurgents in three northwest districts and have carried out air raids in South Waziristan ahead of a widely expected ground assault against Mehsud.

Pakistan, however, publicly opposes the US strikes, saying they violate its territorial sovereignty and deepen resentment among the populace. Since August 2008, at least 45 such strikes have killed around 450 people.

The United States military does not, as a rule, confirm drone attacks, but its armed forces and the CIA operating in Afghanistan are the only forces that deploy unmanned aircraft in the region.

Washington has put Pakistan at the heart of the fight against al-Qaeda and has deployed 4000 Marines against Taliban strongholds in southern Afghanistan under a major assault launched as part of a sweeping new war plan.