Pro-Taliban militants ambushed a Pakistani army convoy in the restive North Waziristan tribal region, killing six soldiers and six rebels, officials said on Tuesday. The convoy came under attack on Monday in the mountains near the main town of Miranshah while heading towards Beermal on the Afghan border.
Four soldiers were martyred and three militants were killed.
"They first detonated an explosive with remote control on the roadside and then opened fire on the convoy," an intelligence official told Reuters.
He said eight soldiers were wounded in the fighting that lasted for an hour. In another incident two soldiers were martyred and three miscreants were killed in a clash on Monday night near the Afghan border.
Around a dozen soldiers were also wounded when militants attacked a military convoy near Dattakhel village, some 15 kilometers west of Miranshah.
"Miscreants attacked a convoy of security forces that resulted in some casualties," chief military spokesman Major General Shaukat Sultan told AFP.
Local officials said the clash left two soldiers and three militants dead, and added that on Tuesday Pak helicopter gunships pounded Pyekhel village, the suspected launching point for the militants' attack.
Also on Monday, security forces in Miranshah opened fire on a group of militants after they fired several rockets at a paramilitary checkpost.
The retaliatory fire resulted in the death of a tribesman, who was one of a group of locals watching a football match in the suburbs of the town, a local official said.