Pakistan's military has denied that a US drone attack was behind the deaths of as many as 22 people in the country's tribal areas, insisting that the campaign against the Taliban there is a purely Pakistani offensive. The confusion over the incident on Saturday came after the military claimed it had captured the hometown of Hakimullah Mehsud, the Pakistani Taliban leader in South Waziristan.
Soon after the military's announcement about the town of Kotkai, officials were quoted as saying a missile from a suspected US drone attack had hit a house in Chuhatra village in Bajaur.
"The missile hit home of Maulvi Faqir [a local Taliban commander] and we have reports of 10 dead," Abdul Malik, an official in the region, was quoted by the Reuters news agency as saying.
Other reports said 14 people had been killed. The Associated Press quoted Mohammad Jamil, a government official, as saying the suspect US drone attack had killed as many as 22 people.
The target appeared to be Faqir Mohammad, a prominent Taliban leader, but he is believed to have escaped, Jamil said.
All of those killed were said to be Taliban fighters.
But the military denied the reports and insisted the blast came from explosives being loaded into a car parked close to Faqir's house.
Alan Fisher, Al Jazeera's correspondent reporting from Islamabad, said: "What the army is saying is [that] there was no drone attack there - what it was, [they say] was explosives parked in a vehicle near the house and they went off, destroying three houses in the village and killing a number of people."The army say they have kicked out all foreign influences and this is an operation being conducted solely by the Pakistani military."
In a briefing for the media, Qamar Zaman Kaira, the federal information minister, said Islamabad had no agreement with the US on drone strikes.
The Pakistani authorities have always publicly criticised drone attacks inside Pakistani territory, saying that such attacks violate Pakistani sovereignty and help to create sympathy for Taliban fighters and boost their ranks.
Source: Al Jazeera (English)
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