26 Pakistani Fighters Killed by Army in Northwest Region

Pakistan army: 26 militants killed in northwest

Sat Mar 28, 2009, 9:31 am ET

ISLAMABAD –

Pakistan's army says troops backed by artillery and helicopter gunships have killed 26 alleged Pakistani fighters near the Afghan border.

The army said in a statement Saturday that the alleged Pakistani fighters were killed in an operation in Mohmand, a frontier region where security forces have been battling Pakistani Taliban fighters for months.

The statement didn't mention any casualties among the troops.

PESHAWAR, Pakistan (AP) —

Dozens of alleged Pakistani fighters fired rockets early Saturday at a transport terminal in northwest Pakistan that is used to ship supplies to NATO troops based in Afghanistan, police said.

At least 12 shipping containers were damaged in the attack at the Farhad terminal in Peshawar, capital of troubled North West Frontier Province, local police official Zahur Khan told The Associated Press. He said police opened fire at the alleged Pakistani fighters but they managed to flee.

The attack came less than a day after a suicide bomber blew up in a packed mosque in North West Frontier Province's Khyber tribal region, killing 48 people and wounding scores more in the worst attack to hit Pakistan this year.

Afghan-based U.S. and NATO forces get up to 75 percent of their supplies via routes that pass through Khyber and a southwestern Chaman border crossing — areas where Taliban militants are believed to be operating.

AIlleged Pakistani fighters were suspected in Friday's deadly mosque attack, apparently to avenge recent military operations in the area aimed at protecting the NATO supply route, authorities said.

The route passes in front of the mosque, where about 200 worshippers were present at the time of the blast.

Shortly after the attack, tribal police detained two suspects who were making a video near the mosque and investigators believed the men were linked to those who orchestrated the bombing, two local security officials said Saturday.

The officials — who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media — provided no further details and only said the men were still in police custody and being questioned.

Several security officers were also killed in Friday's attack.

___

Associated Press writers Asif Shahzad in Islamabad, Ishtiaq Mahsud in Dera Ismail Khan and Sebastian Abbot in Kabul, Afghanistan, contributed to this report.

Fair Use Notice

This site contains copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. We are making such material available in our efforts to advance understanding of environmental, political, human rights, economic, democracy, scientific, and social justice issues, etc. We believe this constitutes a 'fair use' of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. For more information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml. If you wish to use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.