Pakistan jets attack militants ahead of expected offensive close to Afghan border

October 12th, 2009 ISLAMABAD - Pakistani jet fighters pounded Taliban targets in the troubled north-western region near the Afghan border Monday, killing at least 12 militants, officials said. The airstrikes took place in the Bajaur tribal district, where government forces in March declared victory after a six-month offensive against the Taliban.

October 10th, 2009 Commandos launch assault to free Pakistan hostagesRAWALPINDI, Pakistan — Pakistani commandos raided a building inside army headquarters early Sunday and freed most of about a dozen soldiers held hostage there by Islamist militants for more than 18 hours, an army spokesman said. Three loud explosions and gunshots were heard from inside the complex close to the capital before dawn, and three ambulances were seen driving out.

July 18th, 2009 Pakistani jets kill 6 militants in northwestDERA ISMAIL KHAN, Pakistan — Pakistani fighter jets destroyed two suspected militant hide-outs near the Afghan border, killing six men believed to be associates of top local Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud, intelligence officials said Wednesday. The strikes in South Waziristan flattened the hide-outs of Mehsud's associates in two villages late Tuesday, two intelligence officials said.

July 10th, 2009 Militants attack security post in Pakistan; 4 deadISLAMABAD — Militants overran a security post and killed four officers in a northwestern Pakistani region that the army claimed to have cleared of insurgents earlier this year, a government official said Friday. Elsewhere in the Afghan border region, fighter jets killed 24 insurgents and security forces arrested 40 militants, intelligence officers and a government spokesman said.

July 10th, 2009 Airstrikes in northwest Pakistan kill 24 militantsISLAMABAD — Pakistani fighter jets killed 24 insurgents close to the Afghan border while security forces arrested 40 militants in raids in another northwestern region, officials said Friday. Under heavy U.S.

July 8th, 2009 ISLAMABAD - A suspected US missile strike on a Taliban bastion in north-western Pakistan killed at least eight militants Wednesday, an intelligence official said. Six missiles fired allegedly by US Predator drones at around 1.30 a.m.

July 7th, 2009 Suspected US missiles, Pakistan jets hit militantsISLAMABAD — Suspected U.S. missiles and Pakistani fighter jets attacked followers of a notorious militant leader close to the Afghan border Tuesday, but the army complained the American strikes were hurting its campaign against the country's public enemy No.

July 4th, 2009 ISLAMABAD - Twelve militants were killed Saturday after security forces bombed their hideouts in northwest Pakistan, TV reports said. Combat helicopters and fighter jets of the security forces have destroyed three militants' hideouts in the Orakzai tribal agency near the Afghan border, reports said.

July 2nd, 2009 Pakistan moves troops to Afghan borderISLAMABAD — Pakistan's army has deployed troops to a stretch of the Afghan border to stop Taliban militants fleeing a major U.S. offensive in southern Afghanistan, a spokesman said Thursday.

July 2nd, 2009 ISLAMABAD - The Pakistan Army has 'reorganized' its troops along the Afghan border to prevent the spill over of militants from the neighboring country following the fresh US-Afghan onslaught on the Taliban today. "We've mustered more troops from the other areas of the border to deploy opposite the Helmand region.

July 2nd, 2009 ISLAMABAD - Pakistan's Army has deployed troops to a stretch of the Afghan border to stop Taliban militants fleeing a major US offensive in southern Afghanistan, a military spokesman said Thursday. Major General Athar Abbas told Geo TV that they had "mustered more troops from the other areas of the border" to deploy opposite the Helmand region, "It is sort of a reorganisation," he said, adding that the threat of militants crossing over had been "visualised".

April 20th, 2009 ISLAMABAD - At least twenty militants were reportedly killed in an offensive launched by the Pakistan Air Force (PAF) in the Orakzai region of the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA), Pakistan military officials have claimed. According to the Dawn, PAF jets and helicopter gunships launched an attack targeting a close aide of Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud, Hakimullah Mehsud, who had claimed the responsibility for a suicide car-bomb attack on a security convoy in which 25 security personnel were killed near Kohat town of the agency.

March 13th, 2009 ISLAMABAD - At least 14 people have been killed in a suspected US drone attack on a Taliban training centre in northwestern Pakistan, the News reported Friday. The late Thursday attack in Barjo village of the Kurram tribal district bordering the Afghan province of Khost also injured more than 40 people, mostly militants, the report said, quoting sources.

March 13th, 2009 ISLAMABAD - A unmanned US drone has killed at least 12 people in Pakistan's Kurram district near the Afghan border, a local official said. "Taleban militants have sealed off the area and are retrieving bodies from the rubble," said a security official.

January 17th, 2009 ISLAMABAD - Paramilitary troops killed at least 15 Islamist militants in the troubled north-western tribal region close to the Afghan border, the military and officials said Sunday. Fifteen rebels were killed in a raid by the Frontier Corps (FC) soldiers on a militant stronghold in Darwazgai area of Mohmand tribal district, according to an FC statement.