At least 26 militants were killed and about a dozen of their hideouts destroyed as Pakistan’s air force bombed targets in northwestern tribal areas on Friday, officials said.
At least 18 militants were killed in Orakzai tribal district and seven of their hideouts destroyed after raids by Pakistani jet fighters, local government official Zaman Khattak told AFP.
He said the air strikes took place in Mehmood Zai area of Orakzai, a known militant stronghold.
Separately in neighbouring Kurram tribal district, which borders Afghanistan, jet fighter attacks killed eight militants and destroyed five of their hideouts, local government official Sher Bahadar Khan told AFP.
Intelligence officials confirmed the air strikes and death toll.
Taliban and Al-Qaeda-linked militants frequently launch attacks across northwestern Pakistan and the lawless tribal belt on the Afghan border.
Under US pressure to crack down on militants’ havens on the border, Pakistan has in the past two years stepped up military operations against largely homegrown militants in the tribal regions.
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Friday she was even more committed to Pakistan after Osama bin Laden’s killing, but said the country needed to do more in its battle with militants.
Clinton is the most senior US official to visit Islamabad since relations between the wary allies went into freefall over the unilateral US Navy SEALs raid on May 2 in Abbottabad.
Pakistan has suffered a wave of attacks since the US raid, with the country’s main Taliban faction vowing to strike Pakistani and American targets to avenge his death in the American raid.
On the eve of Clinton’s visit, 35 people were killed in a suicide car bombing outside a Pakistani police station in the northwestern town of Hangu late Thursday.
