LANDI KOTAL, Jan 6: Nine people, three children among them, were killed when a live artillery shell exploded in a house in Miangano Kalay village in Tirah Valley on Monday.

Some villagers had found the shell in the field and taken it to the house. According to neighbours, they were trying to split it with a saw when it exploded. The explosion also injured 10 villagers who had gathered at the place.

The dead included three activists of banned militant group Lashkar-i-Islam, it is learnt. The injured were taken to private clinics.

In another incident, a woman was killed and her daughter was critically injured when explosives went off in their house in Gud Malang area in Bara on Monday morning.

Sources said that the house belonged to an arms dealer who had stockpiled arms and ammunition in a room. The cause of the explosion could not be ascertained immediately.