Pakistani troops in offensive to capture terrorists

PAKISTANI troops backed by helicopters launched an offensive yesterday to capture foreign terrorists in the mountains along the Afghan border where Osama bin Laden is thought to have bolt-holes.

The operations follow a bloody series of attacks this week in Afghanistan suspected of being carried out by

Taliban and possibly al-Qaida fighters, amid new calls purportedly by bin Laden in a taped message for Muslims to attack US forces and their allies.

Army spokesman General Shaukat Sultan, refused to say whether the operation underway in Wana, just across the border from Afghanistan’s troubled Paktika province, had been launched to capture bin Laden or any other al-Qaida leader.

“I will not make any comment about it,” Sultan said. “This operation is part of our campaign in the war on terror. So far, no foreigner has been arrested but we are questioning some local tribesmen.”

The US military in Afghanistan declined to comment whether bin Laden might be in the area targeted by the Pakistani operation, but noted that US troops had not stepped up operations on the Afghan side of the border.

Pakistani troops have recently increased operations in the deeply conservative tribal areas along the Afghan border, where the central government traditionally has little control and are suspected of harbouring al-Qaida fugitives and fighters of Afghanistan’s ousted Taliban regime.

A Pakistani intelligence official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said authorities received a tip that 15-20 armed men believed to be foreigners were taking refuge in three compounds in a village in the tribal area of South Waziristan.

Tribal elders were contacted and asked the men to surrender, but they refused, prompting a raid by helicopters and soldiers in which gunfire was exchanged, the official said.

There was no word about casualties or arrests.

The three Pakistanis who owned the houses were being hunted and one compound was bulldozed after a search found no one, said Brigadier Mehmood Shah, a military commander in the tribal area.