At least 40 militants were killed in a suspected US drone attack in Pakistan this afternoon, intelligence officials said.
US drones attacked militants in northwest Pakistan twice today, killing more than 40 fighters, security officials said, while the army said the Taliban chief in Swat had been wounded.
The attacks by the pilotless US aircraft were in the South Waziristan region on the Afghan border, a stronghold of Pakistani Taliban leader and al-Qaeda ally Baitullah Mehsud.
The Pakistan army is preparing an offensive against Mehsud, who the military says is responsible for 90 per cent of terrorist attacks in Pakistan. The government said he plotted the assassination of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto in 2007.
The United States, grappling with an intensifying Afghan insurgency, began stepping up attacks by drones on northwestern Pakistani militant enclaves a year ago.
But Pakistan officially objects to the strikes on its soil, saying they violate its sovereignty and undermine its efforts to deal with militancy by inflaming public anger and bolstering support for the militants.
A drone fired several missiles at a militant convoy in the second attack of the day, Pakistani intelligence officials said. "The Taliban appeared to be shifting to another place when they were hit," said one of the agency officials. Another official said 25 to 30 militants were killed.
Earlier today, US drones fired six missiles into a Pakistani Taliban training camp in another part of South Waziristan, killing six militants, government and intelligence agency officials said.
A Pakistani military spokesman said the leader of the Taliban in Swat, Fazlullah, had been wounded in an air strike by Pakistani aircraft there on Monday. A fiery self-proclaimed Muslim cleric, Fazlullah, has been on the run since the military launched the offensive in the former tourist valley.
US President Barack Obama has made defeating al Qaeda and stabilising Afghanistan a top priority and Pakistan has a crucial role to play in achieving that.
The United States has announced a reward of $5 million for information leading to Mehsud's arrest or location, while Pakistan last month posted a reward of 50 million rupees ($615,000) for him.
After an alarming expansion of militant influence in northwest Pakistan, the army went on the offensive two months ago, attacking the militants allied with Mehsud who had taken control of the Swat valley, northwest of Islamabad. While Pakistan battles the Taliban on its side of the Afghan border, thousands of US Marines have launched an offensive against the Afghan Taliban in the southern Afghan province of Helmand.
Reuters