Islamabad: At least seven suspected militants were killed in a US drone strike on Tuesday in Pakistan’s North Waziristan tribal region, local media reports said.
Two missiles were fired at a house in the Shawal area of North Waziristan, one of the seven tribal districts near the Afghan border.
A military operation against terrorists has been going in North Waziristan since mid-June and according to the military, more than 1,000 local and foreign militants have been killed so far in the offensive.
On Monday, a drone attack reportedly killed eight people and wounded six others, also in Shawal district of North Waziristan.
The drone targeted the compound belonging to a Taliban commander identified as Habib.
The strike destroyed the compound, but reports quoted security sources as saying it was not known whether Habib was among the dead.
On Sunday, a drone attack had reportedly killed five suspected militants in South Waziristan.
The United States halted drone strikes for the first six months of 2014 while the government engaged in ultimately fruitless peace talks with the Taliban insurgency.
But the strikes restarted in June, just days before the military announced an anti-Taliban offensive, and their pace stepped up this month.
The Shawal valley is a thickly forested, mountainous area where many of the militants who fled the anti-Taliban offensive are believed to be hiding.
Pakistan’s government routinely publicly protests the strikes as an infringement of its national sovereignty. But former President Pervez Musharraf admitted strikes during his term were approved.
— With additional inputs from Reuters
