7 Arabs among missile victims

Published January 31, 2008

MIRAMSHAH, Jan 30: Militants retrieved and buried on Wednesday the bodies of 12 foreigners who had been killed in a missile attack on a residential compound in the Khushali Toorikhel area of North Waziristan on Monday night.

Local people said the identity of the militants killed in the attack remained unknown but according to unconfirmed reports seven of them were Arabs while the other five from central Asian.

The compound, located about three kilometres south of Mirali town, is owned by Abdus Sattar, a driver, who survived the attack.

A large number of militants had surrounded the site to get the bodies which the later buried in a local graveyard.

“Militants are still keeping the local people away from the place,” a villager told Dawn on phone. He said that unmanned air vehicles had hovered over the area on Wednesday.

The attack is a mystery because it is still not known who had fired the missile.

Some local people claimed that a drone had fired the missile but officials have been keeping quiet.

“I heard the sound of a plane just before the explosion,” said the man who identified himself as Zaheer Gul.

Several places in the North Waziristan have come under attack in the recent past. A house was attacked in Mosaki village in Mirali tehsil in December 2005 in which Al Qaeda’s operational commander Hamza Rabia was killed.

Meanwhile, militants attacked a security base in the Razmak sub-division of North Waziristan on Wednesday.

According to sources, two army soldiers were killed while another was injured in the afternoon attack.

They said that the militants had sneaked into Razmak from the adjacent Makin area where security forces had launched an operation against supporters of Baitullah Mehsud.

Opinion

Editorial

Environment Day
05 Jun, 2023

Environment Day

OUR world is not reusable nor can it be made perishable. As the plastic tide spins out of control, World Environment...
Spending for votes
05 Jun, 2023

Spending for votes

THE cash-strapped government’s plans to boost its annual development spending by as much as 31pc in the next...
On schadenfreude
Updated 05 Jun, 2023

On schadenfreude

Was it a ‘crime’ that he spoke out against the abuses being suffered by PTI workers at the hands of the state?
Surveillance state
Updated 04 Jun, 2023

Surveillance state

IN the midst of the madness, finally some sanity. Questions critical to the right to privacy of citizens bombarded ...
Transport crisis
04 Jun, 2023

Transport crisis

LIKE many other public-sector projects, governments past and present have promised numerous times to ‘revive’ ...
The Buzdar mystery
04 Jun, 2023

The Buzdar mystery

THE departure of former Punjab Chief Minister Usman Buzdar from politics is not really surprising as the PTI is...