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Baluch militants kill four, wound three in Pakistan

Pakistani rebels ambushed a pickup truck in the remote southwest, killing at least four people and injuring three, authorities and the militants said yesterday.

The vehicle, carrying seven men from the pro-government Masuri Bugti tribe to a local gas field, was attacked with a rocket by a group of masked men near Nilagh, about 350km east of Quetta, said Najamuddin Tareen, the area police chief.

The Baluch Liberation Army, a militant group demanding greater rights and increased royalties for gas and minerals in the southwestern province of Baluchistan, claimed responsibility, according to Sarbaz Baluch, who said he was a spokesman for the group.

The army has launched an offensive against the insurgency.

The attack came as opposition leaders lashed out at Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf at raucous rallies across Pakistan, telling thousands to vote for change in the Jan. 8 parliamentary election.

The poll is seen as crucial to restoring democracy after a six-week state of emergency that ended on Dec. 15, as well as a corresponding crackdown on the independent judiciary and perceived government opponents.

The election will also have deep implications for the future of former army chief Musharraf's administration, seen as a key US ally in the "war on terror."

Former prime Ministers Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif, who both returned from exile to lead their opposition parties' campaigns, have promised to jointly try loosening Musharraf's grip on power.

Sharif told 3,000 people on Monday in the southern town of Sukkur that Musharraf presided over a worsening economy and sparked violence across the Islamic country.

A day earlier, a suicide bomb attack in the northwestern Swat region killed five civilians and four soldiers.

The Tehrik-i-Taliban, a new coalition of Islamic militants committed to holy war against the government, said it was behind the bombing. It demanded the military end anti-militant operations in Swat -- where they military says it has killed about 300 militants since last month -- and withdraw from the northwest.

The bombing "was just a warning shot ... The government should expect more if our demands are not met," Maulana Mohammed Umer, a spokesman for the militant group, said by telephone from an unknown location.

Taliban and al-Qaida militants have recently extended their influence in the northwest and launched numerous suicide attacks.

Voters must choose "whether Pakistan will be ruled by a few generals or 160 million people," said Sharif, ousted by Musharraf in a 1999 coup.

Pervez Elahi, the likely candidate of the ruling Pakistan Muslim League-Q party, told a rally of about 3,000 people in Jhelum city, southeast of Islamabad, that Musharraf's 1999 coup saved Pakistan when it was about to become a failed state.

Meanwhile, a coalition of opposition parties -- who are boycotting the election to protest Musharraf's crackdown on dissent -- urged its supporters to block the country's roads on election day to sabotage the vote.
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