'Airstrike may have killed al-Qaida members'

Pakistan’s President General Pervez Musharraf said today there were indications that al-Qaida members were killed in a US airstrike near the Afghan border on January 13.

“Investigations have found that there are foreigners there, that is for sure, in the general areas,” Musharraf said about the airstrike in the northern Pakistan village of Damadola in which at least 13 residents were killed.

“There is an indication that there were some people also, al-Qaida people, who have got killed and we need to ascertain that. I’m not 100% sure of that,” Musharraf said.

Pakistani Government officials have said there were foreign militants in the area and that some were killed in the airstrike but that they have not yet found the bodies.

Musharraf, is a close ally in Washington’s war on terror. The missile strike, which the Americans say targeted but missed Osama bin Laden’s second-in-command, Ayman al-Zawahri, has infuriated many Pakistanis.