By Nasrullah Khan in Pakistan | November 07, 2008
TWO suicide bombers in northwest Pakistan have killed 19 people, as airstrikes pounded extremist targets in a region known as a Taliban safe haven.
Seventeen people were killed and 45 injured when a suicide attacker blew himself up as a government-backed tribal force or "lashkar'' met in Batmalai, about 40km from the main town of Bajaur district, Khar.
Later, a suicide bomber ploughed his explosives-laden car into a camp of paramilitary forces in Mingora, the main town in the nearby restive Swat valley, killing two and injuring 11.
Pakistani military airstrikes elsewhere in Bajaur killed 17, including militants, while 15 rebels died in similar strikes a day earlier, local officials revealed.
The first suicide attack also left 30 people seriously injured, hospital and security sources said.
Local police official Fazal-i-Rabi said: "Two to three hundred members of the lashkar were finalising their strategy after demolishing houses of militants when the blast occurred.''
Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari denounced the blast as a "heinous crime'', pledging to track down those behind it and eradicate extremism from the country "at all costs'', state media reported.
The second suicide attack targeted a gathering of several hundred soldiers from the Frontier Corps, the region's police chief Tanwirul Haq Sipra said.
The attack was followed by an "assault'' by Islamist militants, making it difficult to remove casualties, he said.
Swat has been rocked by a violent campaign for Islamic laws by supporters of radical cleric Maulana Fazlullah.
TWO suicide bombers in northwest Pakistan have killed 19 people, as airstrikes pounded extremist targets in a region known as a Taliban safe haven.
Seventeen people were killed and 45 injured when a suicide attacker blew himself up as a government-backed tribal force or "lashkar'' met in Batmalai, about 40km from the main town of Bajaur district, Khar.
Later, a suicide bomber ploughed his explosives-laden car into a camp of paramilitary forces in Mingora, the main town in the nearby restive Swat valley, killing two and injuring 11.
Pakistani military airstrikes elsewhere in Bajaur killed 17, including militants, while 15 rebels died in similar strikes a day earlier, local officials revealed.
The first suicide attack also left 30 people seriously injured, hospital and security sources said.
Local police official Fazal-i-Rabi said: "Two to three hundred members of the lashkar were finalising their strategy after demolishing houses of militants when the blast occurred.''
Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari denounced the blast as a "heinous crime'', pledging to track down those behind it and eradicate extremism from the country "at all costs'', state media reported.
The second suicide attack targeted a gathering of several hundred soldiers from the Frontier Corps, the region's police chief Tanwirul Haq Sipra said.
The attack was followed by an "assault'' by Islamist militants, making it difficult to remove casualties, he said.
Swat has been rocked by a violent campaign for Islamic laws by supporters of radical cleric Maulana Fazlullah.
Source: The Australian
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