ISLAMABAD: Pakistan announced on Saturday a suspension of military operations against Islamist militants for the Muslim fasting month of Ramazan, but a senior official said security forces would respond if attacked.

Violence has intensified in Pakistan in recent weeks with the military battling militants in three different parts of the northwest - Kurram, Bajaur, and Swat. The militants have responded with bomb attacks on the security forces.

The government's top Interior Ministry official, Rehman Malik, said security forces would suspend operations from Sunday night for the month of Ramazan, which ends at the beginning of October, but would retaliate if attacked.

“If militants take any action the security forces will respond with full force,” Malik told reporters in the eastern city of Lahore.

An Inter-Services Public Relations official told Dawn that there was no ceasefire in effect. The cessation of hostilities was only in deferrence to the holy month of Ramazan and action would resume once Ramadan ended.

Pakistani Taliban spokesmen were not immediately available for comment.

The United States and other allies have been concerned the government led by the Pakistan Peoples Party might be less committed to the unpopular war against militancy after the resignation of firm ally Musharraf.

Washington says al Qaeda and Taliban militants are based in sanctuaries in northwest Pakistan's ethnic Pashtun tribal areas on the Afghan border, where they orchestrate attacks in Afghanistan and Pakistan and plot violence in the West.

In a separate incident on Saturday, a missile hit a house in Wana, the main town in South Waziristan, killing five people, said a resident who saw the bodies taken out of the rubble.

The house was owned by a man known to have militant links, residents said. A security official said two of the dead were foreigners.

It was not immediately clear who fired the missile but US-operated pilotless drones have attacked in Pakistani border regions several times this year, killing dozens of militants.

The fighting in the northwest has displaced about 250,000 people, most of whom are staying with friends and relatives.

But nearly 100,000 are staying in camps, some set up in schools or in open areas with little or no sanitation, raising fear of disease and concern the government might soon face a humanitarian crisis on top of its many other problems.