The New Nation - Internet Edition

AFP, Khar

Pakistani troops backed by tanks and fighter jets Thursday killed as many as 100 militants in a restive northwestern tribal area near the Afghan border, officials said.

Pakistani forces have for weeks been targeting militant positions in Bajaur tribal region in a major operation that has seen more than 600 killed-most of them militants-and more than 260,000 people displaced. "We launched strikes against militant hideouts in Bajaur and destroyed several compounds they were using," a security official, who asked not to be identified, told AFP. "According to the latest information from the area, between 80 and 100 militants were killed," he said, noting that the figure was based on intelligence intercepts of militant communications. The official said the strikes were launched after the rebels ambushed a security patrol near the town of Inayat Kili. A market used by the militants for cover was entirely destroyed.

Earlier, a security official told AFP that an office of the outlawed terrorist outfit Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) had also been destroyed. On Wednesday, Pakistani troops killed 22 militants in Bajaur. Elsewhere in Bajaur, Taliban militants shot dead three pro-government tribesmen accusing of spying for the authorities, a local official said.

The bodies of the tribesmen, aged 30-40 years old, were found early Thursday morning near a road in the Tally area, the official told AFP.

Meanwhile, A missile fired by a suspected US drone Friday killed a dozen people in a Pakistani tribal area where American forces based in Afghanistan have been targeting Al-Qaeda militants. The missile hit a house on the outskirts of Miranshah, the main town in North Waziristan, a local official said, in the fifth such strike in two weeks targeting Taliban or Al-Qaeda fighters hiding out in the rugged tribal area.

"The pre-dawn strike destroyed the house and 12 people were killed," the official told AFP, with another 10 people wounded.

The 12 were believed to be rebel fighters, locals said, adding that the house hit in the Tol Khel area had been rented by an Afghan militant organisation, Al Badar, and was being used as an office.

Al Badar, backed by former guerrilla leader Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, has previously conducted operations against Afghan and international forces based across the border in Afghanistan, residents and a security official said.

Missile strikes targeting militants in Pakistan in recent weeks have been blamed on US-led coalition forces or CIA drones based in Afghanistan. Pakistan does not have missile-equipped drones.

Pakistan and the United States have been drawn into a dispute over the strikes, with Pakistan army chief General Ashfaq Kayani this week strongly criticising them and insisting no deal existed to allow foreign troops to conduct them.

As well as the missile strikes, Pakistan for the first time accused Afghanistan-based troops of carrying out a direct attack on its territory, a raid in the South Waziristan tribal zone that left 15 people dead.

US and Afghan officials say Pakistan's tribal areas are a safe haven for Al-Qaeda and Taliban militants who sneaked into the rugged region after the fall of the Taliban regime in late 2001.

Al-Qaeda chief Osama bin laden and his deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri, are widely believed to be hiding in the mountainous region.

A separate strike in North Waziristan on Monday targeted but failed to hit top Taliban commander Jalaluddin Haqqani, but did kill four mid-level Al-Qaeda operatives, a security official and a militant source said.

With tens of thousands of US and other international troops locked down in Afghanistan, US Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman Admiral Michael Mullen said Wednesday he had ordered a new strategy covering both sides of the border with Pakistan.

The New York Times also reported that US President George W. Bush in July secretly approved orders enabling US Special Operations forces to conduct ground operations in Pakistan without Islamabad's prior approval.