PESHAWAR, Jan 9: At least four Pakistan Army soldiers were killed and seven others wounded when their camp in a remote tribal region bordering Afghanistan came under attack from suspected militants on Thursday night, official sources told Dawn.

An official said the Pakistan Army brigade camp at Zari Noor Colony outside Wana, headquarters of South Waziristan agency, came under a hail of rockets around 10.20pm, killing four soldiers of the 23rd Baloch Regiment besides wounding seven including a Khasadar.

Two of the dead soldiers have been identified as sepoy Sabir and sepoy Nazir, while the names of the other two soldier could not be ascertained. Government officials in Peshawar refused to speak about the incident which occurred hours after Pakistani forces raided Kalusha, a village about 12km west of Wana, to capture two tribesmen believed to be providing shelter to suspected Taliban and Al Qaeda militants.

The search for Sharif Khan and Naik Mohammad, the two most wanted Yargulkhel Wazir tribesmen, did not yield anything. Before pulling out, however, the troops blasted the houses of the two tribesmen, whose capture has been demanded by the United States.

The ISPR confirmed the death of four soldiers. "The attackers fired a couple of rockets at the camp near Wana," ISPR Spokesman Maj-Gen Shaukat Sultan told Dawn by phone from Rawalpindi. He said the two soldiers died on the spot while two died of their injuries later.

"It is clear that the attackers were terrorists. Appropriate action will be taken when we complete our investigations," he said. He said the authorities had arrested some tribesmen for questioning.

The tribesmen claimed the authorities had rounded up 25 people following the Thursday night incident. A senior government official in Peshawar admitted the incident could have been in retaliation to the operation in Kalusha.

"This could be the result of resentment against the operation and the attacks probably were in retaliation," the official said. An official source said theSouth Waziristan Scouts camp in Wana also came under a rocket attack at around 2.30am. However, no damage was caused to life or property in the attack.

The local people said the attackers of the army camp used heavy machine guns and mortars besides rockets. The army soldiers in the camp and on the Gibraltar Hill returned the fire.

The firing continued for about three hours, the sources said. Some of the shells hit residential compounds in the nearby villages, people said. The area is close to Azam Warsak. In October last year, eight Al Qaeda suspects and two Pakistani soldiers were killed in an operation in Baghar village in the same tribal region.

Officials acknowledged that the recent series of clashes indicated that the militants had gathered in the South Waziristan area due to the local tribesmen's support.

The officials suspected that the Taliban and Al Qaeda remnants and their local supporters were behind attacks across the border in Afghanistan. The US military base at Shkin in Paktika province has come under frequent attacks in the past.

An official confirmed that the two tribesmen left their houses two days before the operation in Kalusha, apparently getting wind of the impending action against them.

He also confirmed reports of the presence of Al Qaeda suspects at one of the basic health units allotted to Sharif Khan by the tribal administration in the past, but said that they had left the place at least four days before the operation.

The authorities used light canon for blasting the BHU along with the houses of the two tribesmen as a punishment under the tribal laws. A nearby school also received shells and was badly damaged.

"We are in the process of finding out the people behind the attacks, we are working out who is responsible. We will take action when we are done with that," Brigadier (retd) Mehmood Shah, Secretary (Security) of the tribal regions, told Dawn.