04 October 2004	Monday	18 Shaban 1425

PESHAWAR, Oct 3: The death toll on the army side has crossed the 100 mark since January this year when the military began its operation against foreign and tribal militants in South Waziristan.

The figure does not include casualties suffered by paramilitary forces, including the Frontier Corps (FC), scouts and Khasadars, in the ongoing conflict, according to official sources.

Although Maj-Gen Shaukat Sultan, the ISPR spokesman, declined to give the exact figure, he acknowledged that the casualties could be close to 100. In background interviews, senior officials and independent sources described the prevailing situation in the remote tribal area as fluid and uncertain, despite the huge deployment of troops in the region, sprawling over 6,619 square kilometres.

Maj-Gen Shaukat Sultan insisted that the army troops had contained militants and flushed them out from a major part of the region. "Militants have been restricted to small pockets in Laddah and Sarwekai sub-divisions where they are carrying out attacks on the forces," he said.

Of late, the militants intensified attacks on troops and paramilitary installations amid a perception that an increasing number of civilians had fallen victim to relentless shelling.

This perception has widened the gulf of mistrust between the troops and the tribesmen, locals in South Waziristan said. The military, however, has been denying any collateral damage in its operation against foreign militants and their local sympathizers.

Information gathered from various official sources suggest that so far 120 soldiers and officers have been killed in landmine explosions and hit-and-run attacks by insurgents. The number of wounded is thought to exceed 220.

A lieutenant colonel, four majors and five captains have died during various operations. These sources say that self-improvised landmines and remote-controlled explosive devices have been inflicting damage to troops in many areas adjacent to the border with Afghanistan.

Despite claims by the government that about 150 militants, mostly foreigners, have been killed in the operation, the number of casualties suffered by security forces as well as civilians appear to be even higher.

Islamabad has deployed about two divisions of regular troops and paramilitary forces, backed by air force jets and helicopter gunships, in South Waziristan to crush the hard core of well-trained foreign and local militants.

"The militants are in a do-or-die position. They are certainly not giving up resistance," said an official who has spent more than one year in the embattled zone. The army spokesman claimed that the morale of soldiers was high and "you always see them with smiling faces."

He said there was no comparison between Siachen and Wana. In South Waziristan, he asserted, it was like an operation against dacoits, so the government could not declare it a war zone. He recalled that in the past the army had conducted operations in Balochistan and the interior of Sindh without declaring them war zones.