A US drone strike targeting two militant vehicles early Sunday killed at least four rebels in tribal region near the Afghan border, security officials said.
It was the second missile attack in hours in Shawal district of North Waziristan region, considered a bastion of Taliban and Al-Qaeda-linked militants.
The first strike which targeted a compound had killed at least six militants in Shuwedar village in Shawal district on Saturday.
“US drones fired four missiles on two militant vehicles in the early hours of Sunday, killing four militants,” a Pakistani security official told AFP on condition of anonymity.
He said there were up to five drones flying in the area at the time of the attack.
Another security official confirmed the attack and casualties but said the identities of those killed in the strike were not immediately known.
A local intelligence official in Miranshah, however, put the toll in the strike at six.
It was the fourth drone attack since the start of the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan and the second since Pakistan’s spymaster, Lieutenant General Zaheer ul-Islam, visited Washington earlier this month.
Islam’s talks with his CIA counterpart were also said to have focused on drone strikes.
Attacks by unmanned American aircraft are deeply unpopular in Pakistan, which says they violate its sovereignty and fan anti-US sentiment, but US officials are said to believe the attacks are too important to give up.
The latest attacks were in the same region where a drone strike on June 4 killed 15 militants, including senior Al-Qaeda figure Abu Yahya al-Libi.
In protest at US drone attacks, local Taliban and Pakistani warlord Hafiz Gul Bahadur have banned vaccinations in North and South Waziristan, putting 240,000 children in the region at risk.
They have condemned the immunisation campaign as a cover for espionage. In May, a Pakistani doctor was jailed for 33 years after helping the CIA find Osama bin Laden using a hepatitis vaccination programme as cover.
Washington considers Pakistan’s semi-autonomous northwestern tribal belt the main hub of Taliban and Al-Qaeda militants plotting attacks on the West and in Afghanistan.
The Al-Qaeda-linked Haqqani network in North Waziristan, blamed for some of the deadliest attacks in Afghanistan, is one of the thorniest issues between Islamabad and Washington.
Washington has long demanded that Pakistan take action against the Haqqanis, whom the United States accused of attacking the US embassy in Kabul last September and acting like a “veritable arm” of Pakistani intelligence.
Pakistan has in turn demanded that Afghan and US forces do more to stop Pakistani Taliban crossing the Afghan border to relaunch attacks on its forces.
There has been a dramatic increase in US drone strikes in Pakistan since May, when a NATO summit in Chicago could not strike a deal to end a six-month blockade on convoys transporting supplies to coalition forces in Afghanistan.
On July 3 however, Islamabad agreed to end the blockade after the United States apologised for the deaths of 24 Pakistani soldiers in botched air strikes last November.
And then Americans asks Pakisanis why they don't love them, even after the aid of $billions.
We need more drone attacks to kill these terrorists. Who say drone attacks kill civilians? People who say this are the apologists for Taliban and turn a blind eye to their crimes. When they kill Shias, attack security forces, kidnap people for ransom, loot banks, unleash suicide attacks and oppress people in the name of Islam, these apologists run out of words to condemn these barbarians. I salute the USA for conducting these attacks on these barbarians and letting them know that there is someone in the skies that takes them to the task.
We should appreciate the US for killing these barbarians. This is the least punishment for the beasts who slaughter innocent Pakistanis like animals.
As long as the US forces are in Afghanistan, Taliban and their political patrons and sympathizers will keep claiming that their only objective is to drive the occupied forces out of Afghanistan. But that's the half truth. Once the US is out of Afghanistan, they will turn their guns full-time at Pakistan and fight for their own version of Islamic Sharia. This is their real objective. Under the cloak of implementing Sharia, they will want to grab power in Pakistan and Afghanistan at the barrel of the gun. So they will keep killing innocents even when the US is out of the game.
i can see three posts from you in 1 min…
you dont mirror the sentiments of pakistan
you just another Ishtihaaar…a proxy dummy for the ilk of R_M
Happy Eid Mubarak. Please give a single valid proof that militants were killed. Can any body name them………
i am sorry i cannot buy this farce
these are people killed in Pakistan…yes people…flesh and blood ….
it isnt some old goat or rabbit….
we want names tangible names ….
arfeen wald boota…aka shahbaz (known to have committed such and such PPC offense and a PO)
just because gung ho yanks kill people it doesn't make them criminals ex post facto
ya something like that!!!
Comments are closed.