ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s security forces have killed 60 militants during the last 24 hours in a military operation in Mohmand Agency. A Frontier Corps press release issued here Tuesday night said that in the ongoing operation, the Frontier Corps troops have advanced and secured strategic highways.

In the process, militants’ strongholds of Habibzai and Mulakhel were destroyed. In this operation, as many as 60 hardcore militants have been killed. The military commanders said that Umar Khitab, Qari Mumtaz, Haroon Rashid, Bilal, Yaqub, Yar Said, Yusuf and Hamza were among the top militants killed.

Also militant strongholds of Krair and Chingal were decisively engaged. The statement said that there are obvious signs of weakness and desperations in the rank and file of militants, both local and foreign, who were now on the run.

Pakistani military jet aircraft attacked militant positions in Kandharo village of Mohmand tribal region before ground troops moved in to clear the area. Mohmand borders the Bajaur tribal district where government troops, backed by tanks, artillery and helicopter gunships, began a major offensive in August against Al-Qaeda and Taleban militants, who crossed into the region from Afghanistan to escape the coalition forces.

Meanwhile, bus drivers in northwest Pakistan have begun removing audio and video equipment from their vehicles after Taleban militants threatened suicide attacks against those who played music or movies for their passengers, an industry official said yesterday.

Transport workers in Mardan town received letters this week from militants saying that buses offering such entertainment were guilty of spreading “vulgarity and obscenity,” Walid Mir, general secretary of the town’s transport union, told The Associated Press.

The militants said they would check the buses and that suicide attacks would be carried out against vehicles that still had audio and video equipment — prompting union members to act quickly, Mir said.

The Taleban letter complained that traveling in buses that provide audiovisual entertainment was a “source of mental agony for pious people,” according to a text obtained by AP. “It is obligatory on us to stop such violations. We request you to remove the vulgar systems ... otherwise suicide bombers are ready,” the letter said.

— With input from agencies