 | More on the Swat Valley 'offensive': it certainly is. |
PESHAWAR, Pakistan - Pakistani troops have launched a counter-offensive against pro-Taleban terrorists militants in the northwest, pushing them back into forests and mountains, officials and witnesses reported on Thursday.
The fighting has left more than 50 terrorists rebels dead in two days, according to army accounts, as security forces struck back against sweeping gains made in the scenic Swat Valley by terrorists militants loyal to a terrorist radical cleric.
Chief military spokesman Major General Waheed Arshad said troops Thursday killed 12 terrorists militants while clearing trenches and checkposts from a road. Another eight terrorists were killed when security forces launched an attack, Arshad told AFP, saying their mortar positions had been destroyed.
On Wednesday, 33 terrorists insurgents were reported killed when the military pounded their positions with helicopter gunships and artillery. Two soldiers and two civilians died in the unrest, officials said, and a militant leader said three more terrorists fighters died overnight.
Witnesses said that in Shangla district, terrorists militants had disappeared off the streets and moved out. “Terrorists Militants have fled from streets to forests and their mountain hideouts after the military offensive,” a security official told AFP.
| They heard the tribal drums a-comin'! |
Residents said around 700 to 800 troops had also taken up positions in the Belay Baba area, which had been a terrorist militant stronghold a day earlier. |