US drones fired a barrage of missiles at a vehicle and a house in a tribal area bordering Afghanistan on Saturday, killing at least five suspected militants, Pakistani officials said. The strikes in the North Waziristan tribal area were the first since news that a top commander of the powerful Haqqani militant network was killed in a drone strike late last month, also in the tribal region.
Two intelligence officials, speaking on condition of anonymity because they are not authorised to brief the media, said US drones fired seven missiles at targets in the village of Degan in an area of North Waziristan close to the Afghan border. They said the area is dominated by anti-American militant commander Hafiz Gul Bahadur, but they did not know whether the men killed belonged to his group.
Bahadur's faction is alleged to have been involved in frequent attacks on US troops in Afghanistan, but generally shies away from carrying out operations inside Pakistan. Several recent drone strikes have killed militants affiliated with Bahadur's group. A drone strike a week ago in North Waziristan killed Badruddin Haqqani, one of the sons of the founder of the Haqqani network. The US has blamed the group for a number of high-profile attacks in Afghanistan and considers it one of the key factors in undermining security there.
Comments
Comments are closed.