More than 100 Taliban armed with rocket launchers attacked a checkpost near the Afghan border in South Waziristan on Thursday, triggering gunbattles that killed eight soldiers.
It was the second time in a week that scores of militants besieged a checkpost, underscoring the scale of the threat that Taliban and Al-Qaeda-linked extremists pose to security forces.
The Taliban struck early Thursday in Marubi, 40 kilometres (25 miles) from the Afghan border with North Waziristan, stronghold of the Haqqani network, which poses one of the most potent threats to US troops in Afghanistan.
“Eight soldiers were killed and 10 were wounded in the attack. More than 10 Taliban were also killed in the retaliatory firing,” a security official told AFP in Peshawar, the main town in northwest Pakistan.
Another security official in Wana, the main town of the tribal district, confirmed the incident, but said the Taliban left behind only one body.
Taliban and other militants have carved out strongholds on both sides of the porous Afghanistan-Pakistan border, and last week Islamabad protested to Kabul and NATO over a deadly cross-border attack that took two days to quell.
Despite Pakistan coming under huge pressure after Osama bin Laden was killed by US troops in a garrison city on May 2, a leading general last week insisted that any operation in North Waziristan would be of Pakistan’s choosing.
More than 4,400 people have been killed across Pakistan in attacks blamed on Taliban and other extremist networks based in the tribal belt.
On Monday, four civilians were killed and three wounded when a bomb ripped through a vehicle on the outskirts of Peshawar, an area where anti-Taliban militias have been targeted in the past, officials said.
“It was a powerful bomb. It damaged a vehicle and some nearby shops,” police officer Sajjad Khan told AFP.
In the northwestern district of Upper Dir, where the checkpost was besieged for two days last week, another roadside bomb ripped through a private vehicle taking food for Pakistani troops, killing two people.
“The driver and his helper died in the bomb blast,” Johar Khan, a police official at the nearby Barawal police station, told AFP.
Pakistan was forced to send reinforcements to the area last week, after Taliban attacked a border checkpost, killing 34 people including 28 policemen.
CIA chief Leon Panetta, who will appear before the Senate Armed Services committee on Thursday as it considers his nomination to be defence secretary, has warned that Pakistan needs to step up the fight against terrorism.
“Future requests for security assistance will be informed by Pakistan’s response to the counter-terrorism steps we have proposed,” he said.
Afghan President Hamid Karzai is expected in Pakistan on Friday for talks likely to touch on peace efforts with Taliban insurgents.
Pakistan was the main supporter of the Taliban until the September 11, 2001 attacks, after which it allied with the US-led war on extremism.
But analysts believe that while fighting homegrown Taliban, Pakistan has maintained contacts with Afghan Taliban and anti-India jihadist groups in hopes of remaining a pivotal player in the region.
US drones have carried out five missile strikes in the last week in Waziristan, in a move seen as ramping up pressure on Al-Qaeda as well as pushing Pakistan towards taking its own action after bin Laden’s death.
Drone strikes are hugely unpopular among the general Pakistani public, who are deeply opposed to the government’s alliance with Washington.
Taliban attack security checkpost, eight soldiers dead
