Pakistani fighter jets launched air strikes against militant hideouts in the country’s troubled northwest early yesterday, killing more than 50 insurgents, the Pakistan military said.
However, local security officials put the death toll far higher, saying that about 150 militants died in the air strikes, which primarily targeted Uzbek fighters in the federally administered tribal area of North Waziristan.
Among the dead were insurgents linked to the all-night siege of Jinnah International Airport on Sunday last week in Karachi that killed 38 people, including 10 attackers, and all but destroyed a tentative peace process between the Pakistani Taliban and the government.
Photo: Reuters
The mountainous Dehgan area, about 25km west of North Waziristan’s capital of Miranshah, is a stronghold for Taliban and other militants on Pakistan’s border with Afghanistan.
“Today, at about 01:30 hours, a number of terrorist hideouts in Dehgan, Datta Khel in North Waziristan were targeted by jet aircraft. Over 50 terrorists, mostly Uzbek foreigners, were killed in the strikes,” a statement from the Pakistani military said.
“There were confirmed reports of presence of foreign and local terrorists in these hideouts who were linked to the planning of the Karachi airport attack,” it added.
However, local security officials in Miranshah who spoke to reporters on condition of anonymity put the death toll far higher than the official toll.
“Up to 150 people were killed during the strikes early Sunday [yesterday]. These strikes were carried out based on confirmed reports about the presence of Uzbek and other militants in the area,” an intelligence official said.
Another security official said that “the number of the killed people was even more than 150.”
The Pakistan military has not confirmed the higher figure. However, the military statement said “an ammunition dump had also been destroyed during the strikes and that further details would follow,” suggesting the death toll could rise.
Pressure has been mounting on the government to launch a ground offensive in Taliban-infested North Waziristan.
Following the brazen assault in Karachi, the US carried out two drone strikes in the tribal district on Wednesday, the first time the controversial program has been used this year. The same day, Pakistan Air Force jets pounded suspected militant hideouts, leaving at least 25 dead.
No precise number death toll from yesterday’s air strikes was immediately available as they took place overnight in a remote location. There were competing reports about the identity of those killed, but a second intelligence official in Miranshah told media that Uzbek fighters were targeted.
“Uzbek fighters had gathered in the area, they were taking rest when jets hit them,” he said, adding that hideouts of local Taliban and other foreign fighters were also targeted.
Both the Pakistani Taliban and the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan — mainly based in Pakistan’s tribal belt — said Uzbek fighters took part in the Karachi airport assault.
Locals in Pakistan’s tribal regions say some of the world’s most feared Islamist fighters are quietly slipping away from the area in anticipation of an increase in military operations against them. Rumors of a ground offensive in North Waziristan, one of seven tribal regions along the border, have abounded for years, but authorities have held back from a final push, possibly fearing the blowback in major cities such as Karachi.
However, the past week has seen a significant increase in air strikes and renewed drone attacks.
The US reportedly suspended its drone program in December last year to give Islamabad time to pursue peace talks with the Pakistani Taliban aimed at ending a seven-year insurgency that has claimed thousands of lives.
The dialogue resulted in a month-long ceasefire between March and April, but later broke down, with Islamabad resuming air strikes on suspected militant hideouts in the tribal areas.
The army was widely seen as being opposed to the dialogue because of the heavy casualties it has sustained at the hands of the country’s Taliban, which views them as a mercenary force serving foreign interests, but following the breakdown of the talks and the Karachi attack, observers believe both civil and military authorities are converging on the need for more concerted action.
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