Over 30 die in fighting in restive Pakistani region

Pakistani security forces killed 30 militants loyal to al Qaeda and Taliban in the latest fighting in a strategically important tribal region on the Afghan border, officials said yesterday.

Three soldiers, including two army officers, were also killed in the fighting, which began Friday, in Bajaur region described by the military officials as a 'centre of gravity' for the militants.

The security forces backed by helicopter gunships pounded positions of the militants in and around militant strongholds in Loi Sam and Rashakai areas.

Military spokesman Major Murad Khan said 25 militants were killed in fighting on Friday. A military official said five more insurgents were killed yesterday.

"The security forces have cleared the areas around west and north of Rashkai and Loi Sam areas," Khan said.

"The security forces are successfully making advances today," he added.

Pakistani security forces launched the offensive in Bajaur in August and a senior military official on Friday estimated 65 per cent of the militant problem would be eliminated if guerrillas were defeated in Bajaur.

Major-General Tariq Khan, head of the paramilitary Frontier Corps force, said up to 1,000 militants, including their five senior commanders, and 62 soldiers had been killed in the fighting in the region.

Bajaur is the smallest of Pakistan's seven so-called tribal agencies, semi-autonomous ethnic Pashtun regions along the Afghan border, with a population of just one million people.

But it provides access to surrounding Pakistani regions as well as the eastern Afghan province of Kunar.

Pakistani intelligence officers have said al Qaeda second-in-command Ayman al Zawahri was believed to have visited Bajaur in recent years.

In January 2006, a CIA-operated pilotless drone aircraft fired missiles at a house in Bajaur in the belief Zawahri was visiting there. At least 18 villagers were killed.

But the paramilitary force chief said he could not be sure if any top al Qaeda figures were presently in Bajaur.

US officials say Taliban and al Qaeda-linked fighters, financed by drug money, use the tribal regions as a springboard for attacks inside Afghanistan, where Western forces are struggling to stem a growing insurgency.

Pakistan has been under mounting pressure from the United States to eliminate militant sanctuaries in its northwest.