ISLAMABAD, 31 August 2004 — Five people were injured and a military building damaged in an Al-Qaeda rocket attack on a town near the tribal belt bordering Afghanistan, an official said yesterday.
“Five civilians, two men and three women, were hurt when five rockets fired by Al-Qaeda-linked miscreants landed on their homes before dawn yesterday,” a local police officer told AFP.
The rockets hit Bannu city which lies just 100 kilometers from the Afghan border. It is a major base for the bulk of Pakistani troops hunting Al-Qaeda-linked terrorists in the tribal district of North Waziristan.
“Three rockets fell in a civilian area, while two rockets slammed a telephone exchange and a military building in the garrison city,” the officer said, on condition of anonymity.
The attack came two days after a rocket lobbed on a military camp in South Waziristan killed two Pakistani soldiers while an attack on a military convoy left one soldier dead in the neighboring North Waziristan district.
Officer Moinullah Khan told DPA that the rockets were fired at around 12:30 a.m. (1930 hours GMT) and slammed residences in the cantonment area of the town, which is located just 45 kilometers east of the North Waziristan tribal region where Pakistani security forces have been carrying out operations against the Taleban and Al-Qaeda suspects.
“They (rockets) were apparently fired across the Kurrum River to target the military camp from where reinforcement is being provided for on-going operations in the neighboring tribal region,” spokesman Khan said.
There has been an upsurge in rocket or mortar attacks against Pakistani security forces hunting Al-Qaeda fighters since authorities launched a five-day operation in June and destroyed several suspected hide-outs.
That operation in the Shakai Valley, 25 kilometers north of the main tribal town of Wana, left 65 militants and 18 soldiers dead.
Pakistani authorities say 500 to 600 Al-Qaeda suspects, including Chechen and Uzbek fighters, sneaked into the region after a US-led military offensive ousted Afghanistan’s Taleban regime in late 2001. Security forces in a stepped-up campaign in Pakistan have arrested more than 60 Al-Qaeda suspects since last month.
