PESHAWAR: Pakistani combat helicopters killed 28 militants from extremist group Lashkar-e-Islam during raids on hideouts in Khyber region bordering Afghanistan, the military said on Thursday.

In the northwest district of Swat, the military said security forces had killed 23 militants, including 17 around Shah Dheri in clashes, during the last 24 hours.

‘At least 28 militants of Lashkar-e-Islam were killed in shelling by helicopter gunships,’ Major Fazal Khan, a spokesman for the paramilitary Frontier Corps unit, told AFP.

He said the operation was conducted overnight in the Tirah valley of Khyber, one of Pakistan’s seven semi-autonomous tribal areas and through which flows the bulk of supplies destined for US-led and Nato troops in Afghanistan.

Lashkar-e-Islam, however, said eight of its members died.

‘Eight of our members were killed. We don’t know about the rest, they might be civilians,’ Mistri Gul, a spokesman for the group, told AFP.

In June 2008, Pakistan poured paramilitary troops into Khyber to counter militants threatening to take over Peshawar and to stop attacks on convoys supplying Western troops based in Afghanistan.

Authorities accuse the radical Lashkar-e-Islam of kidnapping for ransom in Peshawar, running torture centres and private jails.

The group is also accused of attacking convoys ferrying supplies to Nato and US troops in Afghanistan that travel through the Khyber Pass.