MIRAMSHAH, Oct 2: Pre-dawn rocket attacks on military posts and a camp in the North Waziristan Agency killed three soldiers and wounded six others, officials said on Sunday.
Sources said that miscreants fired at least 40 rockets from different locations on a military post near Ghulam Khan check-post. Few rockets hit the army post situated near the Afghan border.
They said that Rizwan Mahmood and Ahmad Khan were killed in the attack, while four other soldiers were wounded. Few vehicles parked in the post were partially damaged.
The troops retaliated and fired artillery shells in different directions. Witnesses said that two shells hit a house in Hoormaz village and three shells landed in a cattle pen in Barokhel village, killing several animals.
ISPR officials said one miscreant who had been identified as Mohammad Anwar was arrested after tribesmen laid siege to a compound in Saedgi area, while launchers and rockets were also seized.
Miscreants also fired five rockets on a paramilitary camp in Mirali tehsil, east of Miramshah. Hawaldar Latifur Rehman was killed and two soldiers were wounded.
In Spin Wam area, unidentified persons fired a missile on a military post, but it caused no damage.
According to the ISPR, the troops who entered in the besieged Khati village on Saturday after two days clashes had cleared the locality on Sunday.
An official said that the security forces destroyed hideouts of the militants in the locality. However, the main suspect, Maulana Sadiq Noor, had escaped. The troops have completed house-to-house search in the embattled locality.
He said that the security forces had searched the compound of the wanted Mualana, but it was not destroyed on humanitarian ground, because women and children were sheltering there.
In another incident, two persons were gunned down and two others were arrested, one of them in wounded condition, when troops opened fire on a passenger coach at Eisha check-post on Mirali-Miramshah road on Sunday morning.
Officials of the Inter Services Public Relations (ISPR) told Dawn in Peshawar that the two suspects killed in the encounter were militants, while the security personnel seized sensitive documents and maps of military installations from the two detainees.
Unofficial sources said that security forces stopped a passenger coach at Eisha check-post for a search. Passengers got down from the vehicle, while four carrying assault rifles refused to disembark.
They said that the troops signalled the gunmen to surrender themselves for body search and hand over their weapons. When they refused the order, the troops opened fire on the vehicle in which two persons were killed and one sustained injuries, while the fourth was arrested.
The sources said that despite ceasefire tension was mounting in the region and massive reinforcements were on the way. Army and paramilitary troops were seen heading towards the agency and helicopters gunship hovered throughout the day.
Dilawar Khan Wazir adds from Wana (South Waziristan Agency): Masked men gunned down the son of a pro-government tribal elder, Khadeen Wazir, near Zha Gundai, some 15 kilometre west of Wana, on Sunday morning.
Officials said that Najmuddin Khan, along with a relative Aslam Noor, was going to Wana in a pick-up truck when the masked men sprayed the vehicle with bullets, killing Najmuddin on the spot. Aslam Noor suffered serious injuries and was rushed to a hospital in Wana where his condition was stated to be critical.
Malik Khadeen Wazir, chief of a local peace committee, had survived an attempt on his life, while two of his close relatives were killed in the attack last year.
