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Militants abduct eight officials

Pro-Taliban militants have kidnapped eight Pakistani government development workers in a tribal region on the Afghan border, a senior official said.

  • Reuters
  • Published: 00:00 May 20, 2007
  • Gulf News

Miranshah: Pro-Taliban militants have kidnapped eight Pakistani government development workers in a tribal region on the Afghan border, a senior official said yesterday.

The workers, including five women, were abducted on Friday evening while visiting sites for aid projects in North Waziristan, where the government signed a controversial peace deal aimed at ending militant violence last September.

"More than 100 militants ambushed their vehicle and took the eight officials with them," security chief for the tribal region, Arbab Arif, said. The kidnappers freed several guards accompanying the workers and the guards reported the abduction.

"We have engaged tribal elders of the area for their release," Arif said.

Al Qaida sanctuary

No demands had been made, another official said.

North and South Waziristan are hotbeds of support for Islamist militancy. Many foreign Al Qaida members took refuge there after US-led forces ousted the Taliban in Afghanistan in 2001. Beginning in 2003, Pakistani security forces launched offensives in the two regions as part of efforts in the US-led campaign against militant violence.

But the government later struck peace deals aimed at reinvigorating traditional powers of leaders of the ethnic Pashtun tribes, which inhabit both sides of the border, and isolating the militants.

Critics say the pacts have given the militants free rein and have let them expand their influence.

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