Air strikes killed 15 Taliban in tribal areas on Sunday, where militants beheaded three tribesmen accusing them of spying for the United States. Five of the militants were killed in air strikes on a village in Orakzai tribal district, where militants fleeing a military operation in South Waziristan tribal district have taken refuge.
"Two jet fighters carried out air strikes at a militant hideout at Ghiljo. Five militants were killed," a senior paramilitary official told AFP. In a second air strike in Kurram, another tribal district, 10 militants were killed, the official and local administration chief Fazal Qadir said.
The death toll could not be verified by independent sources as the area is under military operations. In North Waziristan, another tribal district and known as a hot bed of Taliban, militants Sunday beheaded three tribesmen they accused of spying for US forces stationed across the border in Afghanistan. "Notes found with the bodies said the men were killed for spying for the US," tribal police official Nisar Khan told AFP.
Khan said the Taliban accused the three dead men of killing "several Taliban and ordinary people". A local security official confirmed the incident.