16 Pakistani Soldiers Die in Attack in Lawless Area

By Salman Masood

At least 16 members of Pakistan’s security forces were killed and 11 were wounded, when a military convoy was attacked Wednesday morning in North Waziristan, part of the tribal region on the border with Afghanistan, the Pakistan military said. The killings appeared to be the latest in a series of attacks against the national authorities by militants who are angry over the storming of the Red Mosque and its seminary in Islamabad last week.

That operation to root out a group of militant clerics and their followers holed up in the mosque complex left more than 100 people dead.

A military spokesman in Islamabad, Major General Waheed Arshad, said that the convoy was on routine duty in the town of Alwara Mandi when it was attacked by militants.

Since the end of the mosque siege last week, about 100 people, mostly police officers and soldiers, have been killed by bombs and shootings in the country’s turbulent northwest, where Taliban influence has grown.

And in an attack in Islamabad on Tuesday, a suicide bomber detonated a powerful bomb near an outdoor stage where the country’s suspended chief justice was scheduled to address members of Pakistan’s opposition parties.

The death toll from that attack rose to 17, with a further 40 wounded, according to the police.

There was no claim of responsibility for the Islamabad attack, though speculation was rampant.

Most of the dead and wounded belonged to the Pakistan People’s Party, which is led by a former prime minister, Benazir Bhutto. Bhutto had publicly endorsed the use of force to end the mosque siege, so it was possible that the bombing was the work of militants who opposed it.

But many people pointed fingers at the Pakistani intelligence agencies, since the suspended chief justice, Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, is a critic of Pakistani president, General Pervez Musharraf, and has become a rallying point for Pakistanis who are clamoring for an end to military rule.

Investigators said they had found the severed body and head of the bomber, and were examining the remains for clues to his identity and motive.

In another attack on Tuesday, three soldiers and a passer-by were killed and two others were wounded when a suicide bomber blew himself up at a security checkpoint in Mirali, in North Waziristan.

The government sent a team of tribal elders on Monday to meet with leaders of militant groups in North Waziristan in an effort to salvage a peace deal with the government that unraveled after the mosque battle.

The agreement was the latest in a series of sometimes contradictory steps taken by the government to restore order in the tribal areas, where civilian administration has steadily eroded in recent years.

The suicide bombing in Islamabad on Tuesday occurred around 8:30 p.m., about 100 meters from where Chaudhry was to speak to a crowd about half an hour later. His convoy was several kilometers away when the bomber struck.

The blast thrust the capital into a new round of disorder, less than a week after the violent mosque siege that has enraged radical Islamists.

(c) 2007 International Herald Tribune. Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.