ISLAMABAD, Aug 4: Fresh violence left 23 people, four of them soldiers, dead on Saturday in the tribal areas. The military said militants fired a barrage of rockets at security checkpoints and then attacked one of them with automatic weapons overnight in North Waziristan.

“The miscreants fired 50 to 60 rockets at five posts before attacking one of them with automatic weapons in Dosali,” military spokesman Maj-Gen Waheed Arshad told AFP.

Fierce fighting ensued and the troops repelled the attackers, killing 10 militants, he said, adding that four soldiers also died in the battle.

In Parachinar, Kurram Agency, a suicide bomber rammed his vehicle into a taxi stand, killing nine civilians. Several cars and shops were damaged in the attack.

Local administration official Sahibzada Anis said the bomber probably detonated his payload prematurely after he had a roadside accident with another car near the taxi stand on a main road in the town.

“He detonated himself after the accident fearing he could be arrested,” Mr Anis said, adding that authorities had ordered an investigation into the attack.

Local official Mujtaba Asghar said the blast damaged several vehicles and five shops.

“Human limbs and pieces of flesh were scattered around the site,” witness Mohammad Sajjad said.

A senior doctor at Parachinar’s main government hospital, Hanif Jan, said nine people were killed and 35 wounded, some critically.

“Five people died on the spot while four died in the hospital,” Mr Jan said, adding that two critically wounded people had been moved to a hospital in Peshawar.

Officials said the violence triggered by the July 10 killing of Red Mosque cleric Abdul Rashid Ghazi in an army raid in Islamabad had claimed more than 230 lives. Interior ministry officials said there had been at least 13 suicide attacks since the operation.

Inter-Services Public Relations said in a statement that army troops had been deployed in Parachinar for assistance to local administration in maintaining law and order in the area. It said the step had been taken on requisition by the district administration.

Meanwhile, Tank police defused two bombs weighing 25kg outside the city.

FC personnel had found suspicious material stuffed in a pressure cooker near the old Custom House, about 16km away from the city, during patrolling .The bomb disposal squad defused the explosive material weighing 10kg. Police also found and defused 15kg of explosives in a gas cylinder at a distance of 300m from the place.—AFP/APP