LADHA: Six militants, among them a Taliban leader, were killed when their vehicle hit a roadside bomb in Ladha sub-division of South Waziristan Agency, official sources said on Wednesday.

Initial reports said that Amir Hamza, a leader of the Khan Said Sajna group, an offshoot of the outlawed Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), was among the dead.

Taliban sources neither confirmed nor denied reports about the killing of Amir Hamza and his five associates in the incident that took place in Zangara area on Tuesday.

No group claimed responsibility for the attack.

An official source said the bomb might have been planted by a rival group of the Sajna group as differences among various factions of the TTP further widened.

The attack occurred five days after a ceasefire had supposedly ended the feud between supporters of Sajna and followers of the late Hakeemullah Mehsud, according to AFP.

On the other hand, TTP leaders claimed that security forces had suffered heavy casualties in clashes with militants which continued in Bobar area for the third day on Wednesday.

Talking to this correspondent from an undisclosed place, they said five helicopter gunships pounded Taliban locations on Wednesday.

But there were no casualties because the locations had been abandoned by militants before the attacks, they said.

They claimed that about 30 soldiers had been killed and 12 nomads injured in the three-day skirmishes.