US drone aircraft yesterday fired more than a dozen missiles into Pakistan’s North Waziristan, a major al-Qaeda and Taliban sanctuary, killing at least 14 militants, Pakistani security officials said.
It was the third drone missile strike on militants in northwest Pakistan, bordering Afghanistan, since a failed bid to set off a car bomb in New York’s Times Square on May 1.
The US is convinced that Pakistani Taliban militants allied with al-Qaeda and operating out of northwestern border regions were behind the attempted bombing.
The drone attack was in Dattakhel village, about 30km west of Miranshah, the main town in North Waziristan.
“Three missiles hit a vehicle and three militants sitting in it were killed,” said an intelligence agency official in the region, who declined to be identified.
The drones then attacked a nearby militant compound, firing about 12 missiles into it.
“The militants have cordoned off the area so far they’ve retrieved 11 bodies from the debris,” a second security official said. “The death toll may rise because the militants are still searching for bodies.”
There was no word on the identity of any of the militants killed but the attack was in an area where members of an Afghan Taliban faction led by a commander known as Gul Bahadur operate. Foreign fighters linked to al-Qaeda are known to be in the area.
Pakistani Taliban fighters fleeing an army offensive launched late last year on their South Waziristan bastion are also known to have taken refuge with their North Waziristan allies.
Pakistan publicly objects to attacks by CIA unmanned aircraft saying they are a violation of its sovereignty and fuel anti-US feelings, which complicate Pakistan’s efforts against militancy.
Unofficially, however, analysts say Pakistan is cooperating with the US in identifying at least some of the militant targets attacked by the drones.
On Sunday, at least six militants were killed in a similar strike in the same area.
US claims that the Pakistani Taliban were behind the failed car bombing in Times Square has also added pressure on the Pakistani government to attack the militant sanctuary of North Waziristan, but few expect its stretched army to rush into any operation there.
New calls from Washington for the army to move into North Waziristan could backfire because they would create the impression the force was acting on the orders of the US — a perception that would undercut the public support needed for such an operation to be successful.
Aside from US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s warning over the weekend of “severe consequences” if an attack on US soil is traced back to Pakistan, most US officials have been careful not to criticize Pakistan in their public comments since Pakistan-American Faisal Shahzad was arrested soon after the terror attempt in New York.
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