PESHAWAR, March 22: Twelve soldiers of the Pakistan Army were killed and twenty-two wounded when an army convoy was ambushed near Sarwakai on Wana road in the volatile South Waziristan tribal region on Monday, official sources said.

The daring day-light attack on a army supply convoy taking fuel and ration to the troops battling foreign and local militants in the remote Azam Warsak area came at around 1400 hours.

The attack appeared to have been carried out by militants on the main Wana road between Sarwakai and Madijun - about 35km to the east of regional headquarters, Wana, the sources said.

Director-General of Inter-Services Public Relations Maj-Gen Shaukat Sultan confirmed the attack on the army but said he did not have any casualty figures.

"Certainly, there has been an attack on our convoy and there have been some casualties on our side but I have no figures. We are still checking and collecting details," he said by telephone from Rawalpindi.

The sources said the attackers used rockets, mortars and automatic assault rifles. There appeared to be no casualties among the militants who escaped after the attack.

The area falls on the boundary between the pre-dominant Mehsud and the second largest Wazir tribe which officials concede could complicate efforts to find real culprits and punishing them under the Collective Territorial Responsibility clauses of the 1901 Frontier Crimes Regulation.

With the latest deaths, the overall casualty figure has shot up to 29 since the Pakistan Army launched an operation on March 18. The sources said the army had blocked the road from both ends, virtually ending traffic on the main road linking the remote tribal region with the settled district of Tank.

The army is believed to have asked authorities in Wana to further strengthen security along the road by deploying Khasadars (a tribal force) and holding the tribes living along the road responsible for security.

The attack came after suspected militants fired rockets and machinegun into the army brigade headquarters in Zari Noor outside Wana at around 2 pm. Five rockets landed in the colony but caused no damage, the sources said.

The forces guarding the brigade headquarters retaliated and the engagement continued for a few hours. "The whole area was reverberating with gunfire and explosions," a source reached by phone in the area said.

Cobra gunships continued to hover above in the targeted areas but did not fire any rockets, witnesses in the area said. Suspected militants also fired rockets into a scouts' fort in Jandola, a semi-autonomous tribal region bordering South Waziristan but caused no damage, the official source said.

Meanwhile, a 22-member jirga sent in to talk to the foreign militants and their local protectors and persuade them to surrender immediately and unconditionally returned virtually empty-handed.

"We were told that those wanted by the government are not there," Malik Ba' Khan, who was a member of the jirga, told Dawn on phone. Two passenger coaches with white flags hoisted on them drove through a string of military checkpoints taking about four hours to reach Azam Warsak, a 15-km stretch that normally takes about half-an-hour.

The jirga set off at around 11.30am and reached Azam Warsak at around 3.30pm. "I am too tired to speak," 70-year-old Ba' Khan said. Ba' Khan, who comes from the Zalikhel tribe, which has borne the brunt of the military operation allegedly for harbouring foreign militants, said they had conveyed to a gathering of about 100 or so fellow tribesmen the government's three-point demands:

That the tribe surrender immediately and unconditionally fellow tribesmen accused of harbouring foreign militants; surrender immediately and unconditionally foreign militants; and secure the release of 12 missing paramilitary forces and two junior level administration officials.

"They said the wanted men are not there and that they would inform the government if they are seen in the area," Ba' Khan said. Significantly, contrary to the government's assertion that the jirga would be allowed to go inside the targeted area to talk to the militants directly, the hand-picked men were allowed access to Azam Warsak only and that too to talk to fellow tribes-men.

In Peshawar, Fata secretary (security) Brig Mehmood Shah warned earlier in the day that the operation would be resumed if militants holed up in that area refused to surrender.

"The operation will be resumed if militants do not surrender", he said at a news briefing in his office. Locals said authorities issued notices to Yargulkhel tribe, a sub-tribe of Zalikhel, warning that their houses and shops in Wana would be demolished.

They said that they had been told that 300 houses and 450 shops would face demolition for not cooperating with the government and failing to surrender wanted militants.

Leader of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, Qari Tahir Yaldashev, who was believed to have been holed up in the area along with scores of other compatriots and Chechen fighters, might not be there, the sources said.

Brig Shah said that the army searching the houses had recovered a telephone exchange. He said the army had captured 124 militants but did not know how many among them were foreigners.

A security official told Dawn the army had sent two bodies of militants, who appear to be foreigners, to Rawalpindi for DNA tests to ascertain their identity.

Local residents said they were worried about the fate of hundreds of people, including women and children, who were living under open sky in Maychan Baba Ziarat, about 13km to the east of Wana, after fleeing their homes in the embattled area. "There is no food and no shelter. They are living in the open without any help from anywhere," complained a local resident.