Pakistan - Fierce battle between Taliban and al-Qaida Uzbeks kills 106 in tribal zone

AFP via translation, and Frontier Post (Peshawar) ^ | March 21, 2007

[HAL9000]

AFP via translation -

Engagements between islamist in Pakistani tribal zone: at least 106 dead

WANA (Pakistan) - the engagements between Uzbek and islamist militants islamist local who have lasted for Monday in the Pakistani tribal zone made at least 106 died, indicated Wednesday to the AFP of the persons in charge for the local services of safety.

Among the victims 78 Uzbek militants and 28 buildings appear, and half of them were killed since Tuesday evening, added under cover of anonymity.

The engagements began after a leader local taliban, mollah Nazir, rejoined with the authorities to expel the foreign militants of the Pakistani tribal zone, had ordered to disarm the militants of the Uzbek chief Tahir Iouldachev, according to these persons in charge.

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Frontier Post - Peshawar

Waziristan clash kills 50 F.P. Report

WANA: Around 50 people including four children were killed in a fierce gun-battle between Qaeda-linked foreign militants and pro-government tribesmen in a dusty town in the restive South Waziristan Agency on Tuesday. Officials and residents said nearly 70 people were wounded, some of them critically, in the high-casualty clash in Kalosha area near the militancy-plagued frontier between Pakistan and Afghanistan, where foreign miscreants are said to be hiding. “For the second day running on Tuesday, followers of Uzbek fugitive Tahir Yuldashev and local supporters of a former Taliban commander (now supporting President Gen. Pervez Musharraf) exchanged heavy mortar and rocket fire,” a security official told The Frontier Post. Although the exact death toll is yet to be independently confirmed, the official reckoned, at least 50 people including four schoolchildren perished in the clash that erupted on Monday. The four students were killed when stray rockets slammed into their school, according to the intelligence operative who did not want to be named. But a schoolteacher, offering a slightly different account of the deadly incident, said the students were hit by a shell after they disembarked from a vehicle. Twenty-five boys suffered injuries in the morning strike that fuelled fears among students, teachers and the general public. Most of the dead in the crossfire were foreign fighters, whose refusal to disarm touched off the second heavy gun-battle in the area in less than three weeks. “The clashes and fatalities prove beyond an iota of doubt that unwanted aliens continue to stalk the remote tribal region,” a political administration official said while cynically referring to last year’s peace deal. “Some senior local Taliban commanders including Baitullah Mahsud and Khalifa Sirajuddin Haqqani are already trying to convince the combatants to cease fire, but at the moment we have no information if they have been able to reach the scene of the hostilities,” the source said. He pointed out the road leading to the area had been blocked and the ‘peace-brokers’ would take time making it to Kalosha and entering negotiations with the fighters. The official warned the situation could take an uglier turn if the exchanges of mortar and rocket attacks continued unabated. Earlier this month, fierce clashes between local tribesmen and foreign militants in Azam Warsak, west of Wana, left 17 people dead. The clashes erupted when a pro-government elder Malik Saadullah Darikhel came under fire near Azam Warsak bazaar. Agencies added: The fighting started after ex-Taliban commander Mullah Nazir, who backs Musharraf’s moves to expel foreign fighters from the troubled area, ordered followers of Uzbek militant Tahir Yuldashev to disarm. Yuldashev, the head of a group called the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, was sentenced to death in absentia for bombings in the Uzbek capital Tashkent. Security officials say he had links to Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden. Thirty-eight of Yuldashev’s supporters were killed and 22 were detained, the officials said, while nine local tribesmen including some of Nazir’s men also died and 64 others were wounded, the officials said. Twelve seriously wounded civilians, all women and children, were evacuated by helicopter to hospital in the northwestern city of Peshawar, they said. Military spokesman Major General Waheed Arshad earlier said he had reports that “around 30 people have been killed in clashes between local tribesmen and militants” but that the toll could go up. Meanwhile hundreds of Uzbek militants and their supporters blocked the road from Wana to Angoor Adda in order to “show their strength against their rivals,” officials said.

[Jedi Master Pikachu]

Asia pinglist

If you want on or off the list, go to the link for instructions. Otherwise, it won't be guaranteed that you will be put on or taken off (it still won't be 100% guaranteed, anyway, but will be much more highly probable).

[Recon Dad]

Where's Jessie Jackson or Bill Richardson to stop this senseless killing!
If this goes on much longer they will be running ads on TV like they do for Darfur.