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The Long War Journal: US airstrike kills 3 in North Waziristan Written by Bill Roggio on December 18, 2009 9:40 AM to The Long War Journal Available online at: http://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2009/12/us_airstrike_kills_t.php The US killed three Islamist terrorists in the third airstrike in two days in Pakistan's Taliban-controlled tribal agency of North Waziristan. The strike, carried out by unmanned Predator or Reaper attack aircraft, hit a Taliban safe house in the Datta Khel region in North Waziristan. Several Hellfire missiles were reported to have been launched in the airstrike. "The US drone missiles hit a house in the mountains," a Pakistani...

MIR ALI, Pakistan (AP) – Two suspected U.S. missile strikes, one using multiple drones, killed 17 people in a Pakistani tribal region along the Afghan border Thursday, local intelligence officials said. The officials said the second, bloodier attack involved five drones and 10 missiles – an unusually intense bombardment. The missiles rained on North Waziristan, considered a safe haven for many militants including groups determined to push the U.S. and NATO out of Afghanistan. The strikes in North Waziristan are especially sensitive because they risk angering Afghan-focused militant groups who have agreed to be neutral as Islamabad cracks down on...

PESHAWAR, Pakistan (AFP) – Pakistan's military on Friday killed 20 insurgents in operations against Taliban strongholds, as the prime minister warned that militants were striking back with attacks in big cities. Armed forces this year launched multiple operations across the northwest tribal belt bordering Afghanistan, the stronghold of the Pakistani Taliban and a haven for Al-Qaeda fighters and other militants. In Orakzai district in the centre of the tribal belt, nine militants were killed and two hideouts destroyed in airstrikes on the villages of Ghiljo and Mamoonzai, paramilitary force spokesman major Fazalur Rehman told AFP. The UN said Friday that...

The US has conducted the first unmanned airstrike in the lawless tribal agency of South Waziristan since the Pakistani Army launched an offensive there in mid-October. The strike, carried out by unmanned Predator or Reaper attack aircraft, hit a Taliban "hideout" in Tanga in the Ladha region in South Waziristan. Ladha is one of several Taliban strongholds that were the target of the Pakistani Army's offensive against the Mehsud branch of the Taliban in South Waziristan. Four al Qaeda operatives and two Taliban fighters were killed in the attack, according to reports from the region. "Eyewitnesses said the toll could...

MIRANSHAH, Pakistan (Reuters) – A suspected U.S. drone fired two missiles into an al Qaeda and Taliban sanctuary in a Pakistani region the Afghan border on Tuesday, killing at least three militants, Pakistani intelligence officials said. The strike in the North Waziristan region was the first since U.S. President Barack Obama's speech last week outlining plans to send 30,000 more U.S. troops to Afghanistan. Obama said Pakistan must not allow its territory to be used as a sanctuary for militants. "One of the missiles hit a vehicle and all three militants in it were killed," an intelligence official told Reuters...

"Pakistani Christian on Run from Taliban Death Threat Islamic extremist sermonizing leads to altercation at barbershop in South Waziristan." SNIPPET: "LAHORE, Pakistan, November 27 (CDN) — A young Christian man is in hiding in Pakistan from Taliban militants who seek to kill him for “blasphemy” because he defended his faith. In February Jehanzaib Asher, 22, was working in a barbershop his family jointly owns with his cousin in Wana, South Waziristan – a Taliban stronghold in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas in Pakistan’s northwest – when the Islamic militants showed up to try to convert him to Islam." SNIPPET: "He...

A suspected US drone aircraft fired two missiles in North Waziristan on Friday, killing eight people, the second such attack this week. Eight militants were killed in a US missile strike in northwest Pakistan on Friday, officials said. The United States has carried out 45 attacks with its pilotless, missile-firing aircraft in northwest Pakistan this year as its forces in neighbouring Afghanistan have faced an intensifying Taliban insurgency.

The US has killed four Taliban fighters in just the second airstrike in Pakistan's tribal areas this month. Unmanned aircraft, likely remotely piloted Predator or Reaper drones, hit a Taliban compound in the village of Shanakhora, which lies six miles west of Miramshah in North Waziristan, with two Hellfire missiles. “It was a US drone attack which targeted a militant compound killing four militants and wounding five others,” a senior Pakistani security official in the region told AFP. “The compound was being used by Taliban militants, however it is not clear whether there were any foreign militants or high-value targets,”...

SARAROGHA, Pakistan (Reuters) – Pakistani forces have captured most main Taliban bases in their offensive in South Waziristan and will soon fan out into the rugged countryside to hunt for militants there, commanders said on Tuesday. Soldiers have advanced faster than expected in their month-long offensive, seizing main roads and Taliban bases but militant leaders have apparently melted away while their bombers have unleashed carnage in towns. The United States, weighing options for how to turn an intensifying insurgency in Afghanistan, has welcomed the offensive but is keen to see Pakistan tackle Afghan Taliban factions based in lawless enclaves along...

The CIA has paid millions of dollars to Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) since 9/11, "accounting for as much as one-third of the foreign spy agency's annual budget", says a media report. The ISI also collected "tens of millions of dollars through a classified CIA programme", which pays for the capture or killing of wanted militants, a newspaper reported on Monday citing current and former US officials. An intense debate has been triggered within the US government due to "long-standing suspicions that the ISI continues to help Taliban extremists who undermine US efforts in Afghanistan and provide sanctuary to Al Qaeda...

ISLAMABAD – The Pakistani army entered the last of three militant strongholds targeted by a major offensive in the northwest on Friday, as gunmen wounded a senior army officer and a soldier in the capital. The operation in South Waziristan, the main Taliban and al-Qaida sanctuary in Pakistan, has sparked a wave of retaliatory attacks that have killed about 300 civilians and security forces in the past month. The shooting in Islamabad was the third such attack in about two weeks. The militants hope the attacks will weaken the army's resolve as it pushes deeper into the isolated, mountainous region...

MIRANSHAH, Pakistan (Reuters) – A suspected U.S. drone aircraft fired two missiles on Thursday into North Waziristan, a major al Qaeda and Taliban sanctuary in northwest Pakistan, killing two people, Pakistani intelligence officials said.

Here is an interesting tidbit of information from the charge sheet against David Coleman Headley, the US jihadi indicted for plotting attacks in Denmark. Headley traveled to North Waziristan and afterward offered his view on the number of al Qaeda and other foreign jihadis in the tribal agencies' largest towns (in response to a think tank survey that said a significant number of people in the northwest approved of the Predator attacks against al Qaeda):

As Pakistani troops advance through South Waziristan, they are coming across quickly abandoned facilities apparently long used by Islamic terror organizations. South Waziristan, and its pro-Taliban Mehsud tribe, has long been a place where government officials only went with permission of the locals. And the locals apparently believed their own propaganda that government troops would not get far if they tried to invade the area. Army artillery and helicopter gunships, aided by air force fighter-bombers, proved more than a match for the tribal warriors, who soon fled to the safer hills. The Islamic terrorists fled with them, often failing to...

Pakistani forces say they have seized control of the town of Kaniguram in South Waziristan, one of the Taliban's key regional strongholds. The army said it had full control of the town, the latest capture in an offensive against militants that began in South Waziristan on 17 October. The offensive has sparked a string of suicide bomb attacks. About 35 people were killed in an attack in Rawalpindi and seven were injured on the outskirts of Lahore. Rewards offered Military spokesman Maj Gen Athar Abbas, in the capital Islamabad, said that the Kaniguram area had been "completely cleared of terrorists"....

The Pakistani military has launched a large offensive involving 30,000 soldiers into South Waziristan, one of the tribal agencies most hospitable to the Taliban and like-minded terrorists. Following frightening Taliban attacks on the Army headquarters and an air base suspected of storing nuclear weapons, the Pakistani government began a belated but aggressive campaign. In order for the Pakistanis to succeed however, the U.S. must demonstrate a similar determination to rout the Taliban in Afghanistan by launching a comprehensive counter-insurgency campaign. The U.S. has been secretly helping the Pakistanis carry out their offensive, providing them with intelligence from unmanned aerial vehicles...

SHERWANGI, Pakistan (AFP) – Hundreds of foreign fighters were on the run in this battle-scarred region near Afghanistan Sunday, the military said, pressing a major offensive into a third week. Between 600 and 800 foreign militants had been in around Kanigurram town but their resistance was broken by heavy bombing from jet fighters, helicopters and artillery, Brigadier Mohammad Ihsan told reporters on a visit to the normally closed conflict area. Commanders have described Kanigurram as a major Tehreek-e-Taliban "operational centre" and base for Uzbek fighters. "They are on the run," Ihsan said. The foreigners were mostly Uzbeks but also Chechens...

ISLAMABAD (Reuters) – Pakistani forces are zeroing in on two major Taliban bases in South Waziristan region as their offensive pushes deeper into militant bastion on the Afghan border, the military said on Sunday. The army launched a major assault in South Waziristan on September 17 to seize control of the lawless land after a string of attacks by militants, including a stunning assault on the army headquarters that killed more than 150 people. The offensive is a major test for the Pakistani government and the military to stem the rising tide of Islamist militancy and is being closely followed...

SHAWANGAI, Pakistan -- An alleged member of the Hamburg, Germany, terror cell linked to the Sept. 11 attacks is believed to be among al Qaeda leaders helping the Taliban fight Pakistani forces in South Waziristan, Pakistani authorities said Thursday. A German passport belonging to Said Bahaji, a close associate of Sept. 11 lead hijacker Mohammed Atta in the 2001 attacks, was among documents recovered this week by Pakistani troops from an abandoned militant compound in Shawangai. The mountain village in South Waziristan was used as an al Qaeda and Taliban command base until as recently as this week, a military...

SNIPPET: "Search at Grundy County plant called part of ongoing probe" SNIPPET: "But a source said the owner of the plant, which processes lamb and goat, was taken into custody at his home in Chicago. Documents and records were taken from the plant and from a Chicago travel agency on West Devon Avenue, also owned by the same person, the source said."

ISLAMABAD – Pakistan's army pushed deeper into a Taliban sanctuary close to the Afghan border Tuesday, claiming to have killed 42 militants in the latest stage of an offensive against extremists blamed for relentless attacks in recent weeks . In the capital, gunmen attacked a high-ranking Pakistani army officer in the second targeted shooting against top military brass in less than a week, part of a wave of violence sweeping the country in apparent retaliation for the 11-day long offensive in South Waziristan. The army officer, and his mother who was traveling with him, escaped unhurt from the assault in...

ISLAMABAD – Soldiers captured the strategically located hometown of Pakistan's Taliban chief Saturday after fierce fighting, officials said, the army's first major prize as it pushes deeper into a militant stronghold along the Afghan border. A suspected U.S. missile killed 22 people elsewhere in the northwest, but apparently missed a top Taliban figure, authorities said. Pakistan's eight-day-old offensive in the Taliban and al-Qaida stronghold of South Waziristan is considered its most critical test yet in the campaign to stop the spread of violent Islamist extremism in this nuclear-armed, U.S.-allied country. The army operation has prompted a wave of retaliatory attacks...

PESHAWAR, Pakistan (AFP) – A mine killed 16 wedding guests in Pakistan's tribal belt on Friday while a suicide bomber targeted an air force base, inflicting another reverse on the military in its war on the Taliban. A car bomb exploded outside a restaurant in the northwestern city of Peshawar, wounding 15 and underlining the threat to civilians in a nation where more than 190 people have died during Taliban-linked attacks in 19 days. The explosion ripped through the wedding party minibus in the Sorandara area of Mohmand, where security forces have been pressing an offensive against Islamist rebels for...

Axis Of Evil: So who mourns when a terrorist dies by his own bomb? Apparently the U.S. and the U.N. do, given their condolences to Iran after Sunday's attack on its Revolutionary Guard. Iran is the father of this terrorism. Over the weekend, Iran was shocked by a massive suicide bomb that killed 49 people, including five top commanders of its Revolutionary Guard and several tribal leaders in Iran's eastern Sistan-Baluchistan province. The attack was a first for Iran and a big blow to the mullahs, whose Revolutionary Guard acts as their military arm. A Pakistan-based terror group called Jundallah...

PESHAWAR: In the first drone strikes since the Pakistan military began its operation in South Waziristan a top al-Qaeda operative Abu Al-Masri is reported to have been killed in a strike from a US unmanned aircraft. However, conflicting reports earlier suggested that Al-Masri may have been killed preparing suicide jackets in the village of Spalga. Known as Mustafa Al-Yazid, he was urported to have links with Afghan immigrant Najibullah Zazi, whom US authorities arrested in an alleged plot to use homemade backpack bombs, he served three years in an Egyptian prison, in the 1980s, for supposed links to the group...

The Pakistani army's push against Taliban and al-Qaeda militants in the Mehsud tribal stronghold of South Waziristan has one paramount objective - to destroy the source of militant attacks in the country. The ground offensive that it launched in the region on Saturday is viewed by analysts as its most serious attempt so far to liquidate the militant network there. This conclusion is based on the tactics the army has adopted so far. Unlike previous operations which were invariably half-hearted, haphazard and abortive, it took its time to plan a thorough operation this time. StrongholdThe ground offensive comes after a...

On July 25, Najibullah Zazi, a lanky man in his mid-twenties, walked into the Beauty Supply Warehouse in Aurora, Colorado, a suburb of Denver. The visit was captured on a store video camera. Wearing a baseball cap and pushing a shopping cart, Zazi appeared to be just another suburban guy.Of course, not many suburban guys buy six bottles of Clairoxide hair bleach, as Zazi did on this shopping trip--or return a month later to buy a dozen bottles of "Ms. K Liquid," a peroxide-based product. Aware that these were hardly the typical purchases of a heavily bearded, dark-haired young...

Big News in the Overseas Contingency Operation (Formerly known as the War on Terror)You might not have heard about it as most "reporters" seem more interested in the Balloon Boy hoax in Colorado! Pakistan Launches Full-Scale Offensive 30,000 Troops Deploy In Militant Stronghold By Karin Brulliard Washington Post Foreign Service Sunday, October 18, 2009 ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, Oct. 17 -- The Pakistani military launched a major ground offensive Saturday in the insurgent haven of South Waziristan, starting a much-awaited fight that could define the nation's increasingly bloody domestic struggle against Islamist extremism. ... After months of targeting South Waziristan with aerial...

Conflicting reports emerge a day after thousands of soldiers launched an offensive against the Taliban and Al Qaeda in South Waziristan. 'We have not been weakened,' a Taliban spokesman says.Reporting from Islamabad, Pakistan - On the second day of Pakistan's major offensive to uproot the Taliban from tribal areas along the Afghan border, the military claimed to have killed 60 militants, while the Taliban countered that it had fended off the troops' initial surge. Wildly differing interpretations of progress being made on both sides are expected to continue as the military pushes forward with its most crucial ground operation so...

Pakistan Closes In On Taliban Leader's South Waziristan Strongholds Pakistan's armed forces are closing in on the stronghold of Taliban leader Hakimullah Mehsud, with heavy losses reported on both sides. By Saeed Shah in Lahore and Daud Khan in Peshawar 18 Oct 2009 Troops were advancing towards the towns of Makeen and Ladha in the mountainous region of South Waziristan, in a military offensive that could prove decisive in the country's struggle against Islamic extremism. On the second day of the long-awaited ground operation, soldiers on three sides approached the area held by the fearsome Mehsud tribe, which forms the...

DERA ISMAIL KHAN, Pakistan – Pakistani troops and the Taliban fought fierce battles Sunday in a militant sanctuary near the Afghan border, with both sides claiming early victories in an army campaign that could shape the future of the country's battle against extremism. A Taliban spokesman vowed the Islamist militants would fight to "our last drop of blood" to defend their stronghold of South Waziristan, .. Victory for the government in South Waziristan's tribal badlands would eliminate a safe haven for the Taliban militants blamed for surging terrorist attacks and the al-Qaida operatives they shelter there. .. Defeat would give...

PESHAWAR, Pakistan (Reuters) – Pakistani forces fought fierce battles with Taliban militants on Sunday, a day after launching a long-awaited offensive aimed at bringing the writ of state to lawless tribal lands on the Afghan border. The offensive on the global Islamist hub of South Waziristan follows a string of brazen militant attacks in different parts of the country, including an assault on army headquarters, in which more than 150 people were killed. About 28,000 soldiers are battling an estimated 10,000 hard-core Taliban, including about 1,000 tough Uzbek fighters and some Arab al Qaeda members, after surrounding militant territory and...

DERA ISMAIL KHAN, Pakistan – More than 30,000 Pakistani soldiers launched a ground offensive against al-Qaida and the Taliban's main stronghold along the Afghan border Saturday, officials said, in the country's toughest test yet against a strengthening insurgency. The United States has long pushed the government to carry out an assault in South Waziristan, and it comes after two weeks of militant attacks that have killed more than 175 people across the nuclear-armed country. That has ramped up pressure on the army to act. Pakistan has fought three unsuccessful campaigns since 2001 in the region, which is the nerve-center for...

ISLAMABAD – The Pakistani military is setting its sights on the Taliban's remote sanctuary after nearly two weeks of big bombings across the country, as hundreds flee the Afghan border region each day before what promises to be the army's riskiest offensive yet. With the first snows of winter less than two months away, the army has limited time to mount a major ground attack. The U.S. is racing to send in night vision goggles and other equipment. The Pakistani military insists it's sealing off supply and escape routes, forcing the militants to rely on goat paths. The army has...

MIRANSHAH, Pakistan (AFP) – A US drone missile attack on a suspected militant hideout in a remote tribal area in northwest Pakistan early Thursday killed at least four people, security officials said. The pre-dawn strike targeted the suspected militant compound in Dandey Darpa Khel in the North Waziristan region near the Afghan border, a security official said. "It was a drone strike and initial reports said at least three people were killed and several wounded," the official said, requesting anonymity. A senior security official later said four people were killed and six wounded. A third security official said two missiles...

PESHAWAR, Pakistan (AFP) – Pakistani fighter jets Tuesday killed six suspected militants in fresh strikes on Taliban strongholds in the northwest, the target of an expected ground operation, officials said. The strikes in South Waziristan come after a militant hostage siege at army headquarters near Islamabad left 23 people dead at the weekend, the latest in a surge in suicide blasts and attacks blamed on the Taliban. The government and military have vowed to launch an all-out offensive in South Waziristan to hunt down the militant leadership, but the timing of the offensive remains unclear. Air strikes have been ongoing...

WASHINGTON (AFP) – President Barack Obama and his Afghanistan war council turn to Pakistan Wednesday, exactly eight years after the first thunderous US air raids heralded a conflict that still lacks an exit strategy. Obama will gather top security, military and political advisors in the secure White House Situation Room for a third in-depth meeting on Afghan policy as he mulls whether to pitch thousands more troops into the unpopular war. On Tuesday, the president told lawmakers he had no intention of reducing the US military footprint in Afghanistan, which will reach 68,000 troops by the end of this year,...

Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan leader thought killed in August strike in South Waziristan Unconfirmed reports from Pakistan indicate that the leader of the al Qaeda-linked Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan was killed during a US airstrike in South Waziristan in late August. Tahir Yuldashev, emir of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, is said to have been killed in a strike by an unmanned US aircraft in the town of Kanigoram on Aug. 27, 2009. The strike took place in a known stronghold of the Taliban forces under the command of Mullah Nazir. Eight Taliban fighters and Uzbek fighters were reported killed...

PESHAWAR: After fighting brief skirmishes against militants, the Pakistan Army plans to unfold in the next few days what military officials characterise as the mother of all battles in South Waziristan, senior military and security officials said on Thursday. ‘If we don’t take the battle to them, they will bring the battle to us,’ a senior military official said of the militants. ‘The epicentre of the behemoth called the Taliban lies in South Waziristan, and this is where we will be fighting the toughest of all battles.’ For three months, the military has been drawing up plans, holding in-depth deliberations...

The Taliban in Pakistan have released a video confirming that their former leader Baitullah Mehsud is dead. A video received by the BBC shows the body of the former head of Pakistan's largest Taliban group lying in a room. It is not clear where it was taken. Mr Mehsud was killed on 6 August in the tribal region of South Waziristan in a missile attack by a suspected US drone.

ISLAMABAD: Pakistani Taliban new chief Hakimullah Mehsud's brother was among 15 militants killed in two US drone attacks in the country's lawless tribal belt, reports said on Wednesday. Hakimullah's brother Kalimullah was among six militants who were killed in the first drone attack in the Sararogha area of South Waziristan Agency yesterday afternoon, Express 24/7 news channel reported. Nine militants were killed in the second drone attack, which was carried out in the evening in the Dandey Darpakhel area of North Waziristan Agency. Several foreigners, including Afghan nationals, were among those killed in the two attacks. Former Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan chief...

Investigators have discovered a "Jihadi village" of white German al-Qaeda insurgents, including Muslim converts, in Pakistan's tribal areas close to the Afghan border. The village, in Taliban-controlled Waziristan, is run by the notorious al-Qaeda-affiliated Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, which plots raids on Nato forces in Afghanistan. ... Khalid Khawaja, a former Pakistan intelligence officer, who describes himself as a friend of Osama bin Laden, said he was aware of a German contingent and that there were a number of Swedish converts too who had arrived in Pakistan "for Jihad". "The Europeans are there [in Waziristan]. The most dedicated people there...

An unmanned US strike aircraft fired missiles at the al Qaeda-linked Haqqani Network in Pakistan’s Taliban-controlled tribal area of North Waziristan. Three people were killed in the attack, which took place near a madrassa run by Jalaluddin Haqqani, the patriarch of the notorious Haqqani family, Reuters reported. The exact location of the strike has not been identified at this time, and no senior Taliban or al Qaeda leaders have been reported killed. The Haqqanis run the Manba Ulom madrassa in the town of Danda Darpa Khel just outside of Miramshah in North Waziristan. The US has conducted several strikes on...

MIRANSHAH, Pakistan (AFP) – A US drone missile attack Monday killed four militants in a remote Pakistani tribal town bordering Afghanistan, officials said. The missile targeted a militant vehicle in Toori Khel village in North Waziristan region, they said. "Four militants were killed," a local government official said, requesting anonymity. He added the number of wounded was not immediately known.

Taliban announces surrender in Swat Valley after leader Maulana Fazlullah 'arrested' The Taliban has announced its surrender in Swat Valley, one of its major strongholds until a Pakistan Army offensive regained control earlier this summer. By Emal Khan in Peshawar and Dean Nelson in New Delhi Published: 11:00PM BST 12 Sep 2009 Its announcement, made on one of its pirate radio stations, came as its charismatic leader Maulana Fazlullah was reported to be surrounded by Pakistani troops, and there were claims that he had in fact already been arrested. Their collapse in Swat, if confirmed, will deal a serious blow...

Two senior al Qaeda leaders are among those thought to have been killed in the Sept. 8 Predator strike in Pakistan's Taliban-controlled tribal agency of North Waziristan. Ilyas Kashmiri and Mustafa al Jaziri may have been killed during the strike in the village of Machi Khel near Mir Ali. Unmanned US strike aircraft are reported to have hit a car and a madrassa in the attack, The News reported. Initially five Uzbeks from the Islamic Jihad Group were thought to have been killed, but the report was revised to two Arab al Qaeda members, three Punjabi jihadis, and two or...

MIRANSHAH, Pakistan (Reuters) – A suspected U.S. drone fired missiles into a hideout of Taliban militants in Pakistan's North Waziristan tribal region on Monday, killing five militants, intelligence officials and residents said. The attack took place near Mir Ali town, a major sanctuary for militants linked to al Qaeda and the Taliban in Pakistan's tribal lands on the Afghan border. "The militants have cordoned off the area and no one is allowed to go to the site of the attack," a resident, who did not want to be identified, told Reuters by telephone. An intelligence official said a fortress-like house...

Special Dispatch - No. 2505 August 25, 2009 Pakistan Taliban Commander: We Have 'Thousands of Suicide Bombers' Who Can 'Target Washington, Paris, London, and Kabul' On August 25, 2009, a Pakistani Urdu-language newspaper reported that Waliur Rehman, the commander of the Taliban militants in Pakistan's tribal district of South Waziristan Agency, had said that his group has "thousands of suicide bombers" who can "target Washington, Paris, London, and Kabul."

German federal prosecutors said Friday they have arrested a man suspected of helping a terrorist cell that allegedly plotted attacks against U.S. troops in Germany. The U.S. military's Ramstein Air Base is believed to have been one of the targets for plotters. The prosecutor's office identified the man only as "Kadir T.," and said he is a German of Turkish origin. He is suspected of acquiring a video camera and night-vision equipment for the Islamic Jihad Union group, prosecutors said. The items were allegedly shipped to Waziristan in Pakistan, prosecutors said. Four men trained by the Islamic Jihad Union are...

PESHAWAR, Pakistan (AFP) – A US missile strike from a drone aircraft Thursday killed at least eight Taliban militants in a tribal area of northwest Pakistan bordering Afghanistan, Pakistani officials said. The strike was followed hours later by a suicide attack in the northwestern tribal region of Khyber that officials said killed 21 policemen. The US strike "targeted a Taliban compound in Kaniguram village of South Waziristan, killing eight militants and wounding six others," a senior security official told AFP. Another official confirmed the casualties and said that the US drone fired two missiles, but added it was not immediately...