tagged w/ South Waziristan
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U.S. army soldiers launched a preliminary operation Tuesday in support of a planned U.S.-Afghan attack on the largest Taliban-controlled town in southern Afghanistan. The Afghan operation is one of the biggest attacks on the Taliban. Gregg Carlstrom says that this will probably not change the course of the war.U.S. army soldiers launched a preliminary operation Tuesday in support of a planned... more
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ISLAMABAD (AP) -- Militant attacks killed six Pakistani security forces Monday, officials said, a day after the Taliban chief warned of terrorist strikes across the country if the army did not stop a major offensive against insurgents along the Afghan border.
The army moved into South Waziristan tribal region nine days ago vowing to crush the Pakistani Taliban, a militant network it says is behind 80 percent of the suicide bombings in Pakistan. Washington backs the operation because militants in the northwest region are believed to shelter al-Qaida leaders and attack Western troops in Afghanistan.
Heavily armed militants assaulted security officials in Toraware village overnight, killing two and wounding four in a three-hour shootout in the area some 60 miles (95 kilometers) north of South Waziristan, police officer Mir Chaman Khan said. Some 10 militants were believed to have been killed.
In Bajur, a tribal region further north, Taliban fighters attacked a checkpoint at Matthak village, killing four security officials. Seven militants died in the clash, said Syed Ghulam Rasool, a local government official. The militants also attacked security check posts at Khar, the main town in Bajur, and Siddiqabad, an adjoining village, wounding at least three security personnel.
Militant attacks in Pakistan have surged this month, killing more than 200 people, as the Taliban have tried to avert the army offensive in South Waziristan. The military announced Saturday its first major achievement in the offensive - the capture of Kotkai, Mehsud's hometown. The army said the town had hosted a training camp for suicide bombers.
Pakistani Taliban chief Hakimullah Mehsud remained defiant Sunday. He said in a telephone call to an Associated Press reporter the militants had not suffered "any significant losses" in Waziristan. Mehsud, speaking from an undisclosed location, threatened to turn Pakistan into "another Afghanistan or Iraq" unless the assault stopped.
The army says troops have captured two key fronts between Kotkai and the key militant base of Sararogha. An army statement said troops secured at least one other important front and fought 16 hours to capture a significant mountaintop.
The militants have fled Kotkai and are sporadically attacking troops with rockets from high ground, the military said.
Independent verification of such reports is nearly impossible because the military has blocked access to South Waziristan. The tribal regions as a whole are difficult to access and largely off-limits to foreign journalists.
The army has deployed some 30,000 troops to South Waziristan to take on an estimated 12,000 militants, including up to 1,500 foreign fighters, among them Uzbeks and Arabs. The U.N. says some 155,000 civilians have fled.
In other violence Sunday, a minister for education was assassinated by gunmen in Quetta, the capital of southwestern Baluchistan province, police official Shahid Nizam said. A nationalist group, the Baluchistan United Liberation Front, claimed responsibility in calls to local media outlets.
The region has been the scene of a low-level insurgency for years to press demands for a greater share of oil and gas revenue in the province.
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Mahsud reported from Dera Ismail Khan. Associated Press writers Ashraf Khan in Islamabad, Habib Khan in Khar and Hussain Afzal in Parachinar contributed to this report.ISLAMABAD (AP) -- Militant attacks killed six Pakistani security forces Monday,... more
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"Humanitarian access remains very restricted," the U.N.'s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) wrote in its latest report.
150,000 people flee South Waziristan as Pakistan begins bombing campaigns in that region, UN expects that number to rise above 250,000
South Waziristan has become a global hub for militants who were launching increasingly brazen bomb attacks in Pakistani cities. The United States and NATO are fighting the Taliban in neighbouring Afghanistan"Humanitarian access remains very restricted," the U.N.'s Office for... more
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MIR ALI, Pakistan – The Pakistani army and the Taliban claimed to be inflicting heavy casualties on each other as fierce fighting raged Sunday on the second day of a military assault on an al-Qaida and Taliban sanctuary close to the Afghan border.
The outcome of the operation in South Waziristan stands to shape the future of nuclear-armed Pakistan and the militant groups seeking to topple its U.S.-backed government. The region is home to jihadists behind soaring terrorist attacks around the country, as well as al-Qaida and other extremists believed to be plotting strikes in the West.
The army said 60 militants had been killed on the first day of the operation, while six soldiers had died. The Taliban claimed to have inflicted "heavy casualties" on the army and to have pushed invading soldiers back into their bases.
It was not possible to independently verify the conflicting claims because the army is blocking access to the battlefield and surrounding towns.
"We know how to fight this war and defeat the enemy with the minimum loss of our men," Taliban spokesman Azam Tariq told The Associated Press from an undisclosed location. "This is a war imposed on us and we will defend our land till our last man and our last drop of our blood. This is a war bound to end in the defeat of the Pakistan army."
Tariq also said the Taliban were behind three commando-style raids on law enforcement agencies in the eastern city of Lahore on Thursday that killed around 30 people as well as the deadly bombing of a police station in the northwestern city of Peshawar a day later.
Accounts from residents and those fleeing South Waziristan on Sunday suggested that the 30,000 Pakistani troops were in for a bloodier time than in the Swat Valley, another northwestern region that the army successfully wrested away from insurgents earlier this year.
...More...MIR ALI, Pakistan – The Pakistani army and the Taliban claimed to be inflicting... more
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Pakistani troops have fired shots into the air to stop US troops crossing into the South Waziristan region of Pakistan, local officials say.
Reports say nine US helicopters landed on the Afghan side of the border and US troops then tried to cross the border. South Waziristan is one of the main areas from which Islamist militants launch attacks into Afghanistan.
The incident comes amid growing anger in Pakistan over increasingly aggressive US attacks along the border. The latest confrontation began at around midnight, local people say. They say seven US helicopter gunships and two troop-carrying Chinook helicopters landed in the Afghan province of Paktika near the Zohba mountain range.
US troops from the Chinooks then tried to cross the border. As they did so, Pakistani paramilitary soldiers at a checkpoint opened fire into the air and the US troops decided not to continue forward, local Pakistani officials say.
Reports say the firing lasted for several hours. Local people evacuated their homes and tribesmen took up defensive positions in the mountains.
The incident happened close to the town of Angoor Adda, some 30km (20 miles) from Wana, the main town of South Waziristan.
A Pakistani military spokesman in Islamabad confirmed that there was firing but denied that Pakistani troops were involved.Pakistani troops have fired shots into the air to stop US troops crossing into the... more
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(CNN) -- U.S. military forces landed at a compound in Pakistan to battle targets linked to recent attacks on U.S. troops in Afghanistan, a senior U.S. official confirmed Wednesday.
The official declined to be identified, citing the extreme sensitivity of U.S. forces operating within Pakistan's borders.
The action was an uncommon one for the U.S. military. Generally, NATO forces do not enter Pakistan except when pursuing insurgents in Afghanistan who slipped over the border or, in an extreme case, to pursue a high-value target.
The Pentagon has refused to comment officially on the attack, but several defense officials acknowledged that U.S. military activity had taken place inside Pakistan.
The senior U.S. official said a small number of U.S. helicopters landed troops in the village near Angoor Adda in South Waziristan, where Taliban and al Qaeda fighters have hunkered down over the years.
Local media reports said the troops came out of a chopper and fired on civilians. The U.S. official said there may have been a small number of women and children in the immediate vicinity, but when the mission began "everybody came out firing" from the compound.
He said the U.S. troops specifically attacked three buildings in the compound. They were believed to contain individuals responsible for training and equipping insurgents who have been crossing the border into Afghanistan in increasing numbers in recent months and staging large-scale, high-profile attacks against U.S. and coalition forces.
The official could not say if the troops were going after a specific individual. Officials told CNN there was no indication the target was Osama bin Laden or his deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri.
Pakistan's Foreign Ministry on Wednesday lodged a protest against U.S.-led coalition and NATO forces for what it said was a "helicopter-borne ground attack" from Afghanistan into Pakistan, an uncommon tactic in the coalition's fight against militants along the violent border.
The coalition and NATO have been seeking a way to effectively battle militants launching attacks from Pakistan's swath of tribal areas along the border. They have become frustrated with Pakistan over the years, saying it is not being proactive enough against militants, a claim denied by Pakistan -- now in political flux after the resignation of President Pervez Musharraf.
Top U.S. and Pakistani military officials last week met on an aircraft carrier regarding American concerns that Pakistan hasn't been cracking down hard enough on the Taliban.
Several times this year, U.S.-operated drone aircraft launched attacks inside Pakistan
The Pakistani Foreign Ministry described the strike as "a helicopter-borne ground attack supported by air assets based in Afghanistan" and called it a "gross violation of Pakistan territory."
Pakistani officials were still counting the casualties. One local official said the raid left 20 civilians dead. Pakistan military spokesman Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas said seven civilians died and others were critically injured.
(CNN) -- U.S. military forces landed at a compound in Pakistan to battle targets... more
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