Violence in Pakistan's tribal belt kills 16

Sixteen people, including eight paramilitary soldiers, were killed in Pakistan yesterday in separate incidents in its restive tribal belt on the Afghan border, officials and residents said.

Eight members of the paramilitary Frontier Constabulary were killed when militants attacked their checkpost in the early hours in Mir Ali, about 24 km east of Miranshah, the main town in the North Waziristan tribal area, officials said.

Residents said helicopters later flew over the area and there had been some firing from them, as well as firing at them from the ground, but Sultan said he could not confirm that and was awaiting more information.

In another incident, eight people, including a woman, were killed and nine wounded in what witnesses believed was a helicopter gunship attack on the house of a militant in Dandi Sadhgy, 8 km north of Miranshah.

"The house belonged to Maulana Noor Mohammad," one of the wounded said from his hospital bed in Miranshah, referring to a religious scholar who supported Afghanistan's former Taliban rulers.

All those killed in the attack were members of Mohammad's family. The scholar was not among the dead, said the wounded man, who declined to be identified.

Sultan said there had been some firing and some civilian casualties in the area but he did not have details. He said authorities were investigating and declined to speculate on a link between the two incidents.

Waziristan is part of Pakistan's semi-autonomous tribal belt that stretches through rugged mountains and deserts along the border with Afghanistan.

Many Al-Qaeda members fled to the region from Afghanistan after US-led forces ousted the Taliban in late 2001, and were given shelter by militant sympathisers from conservative Pashtun tribes that inhabit both sides of the border.

In early December, villagers in the Mir Ali area said a missile fired from an unidentified aircraft, possibly a US drone, killed five people, including Abu Hamza Rabia, who authorities said was an Al-Qaeda leader.

Authorities said Rabia and the four others were killed when bomb-making material stored at their hideout detonated accidentally. His body was not found.

Pakistan has had about 70,000 troops in the region for the past two years after vowing to clear out foreign militants and suppress their Pakistani accomplices.

Hundreds of people - both militants and government troops - have been killed.