2008 Woodie Awards
60 militants killed in northwestern Pakistan
Mick Swasko
Issue date: 11/2/07 Section: News
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (AP) - Security forces killed at least 60 militant supporters of a pro-Taliban cleric in Pakistan's northwest, the army said Thursday, hours after a suicide attack on an air force bus killed eight and wounded 40.
Opposition leader Benazir Bhutto, seen by many supporters as key to a possible return to democratic rule, flew out of Pakistan to visit family in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, two weeks after she was targeted by assassins upon her return from eight years in exile.
Terror attacks and clashes between militants and President Gen. Pervez Musharraf's security forces have deepened the political turmoil ahead of a Supreme Court ruling on whether Musharraf's sweeping Oct. 6 presidential victory was constitutional. There are fears he could impose a state of emergency if judges rule against him, jeopardizing the country's transition to civilian rule. "She has gone to Dubai to see her ailing mother and children," Bhutto's spokesman Farhatullah Babar said Thursday afternoon after the former prime minister was seen stepping onto an Emirates plane in Karachi. "She will come back on Nov. 8."
Bhutto landed at the Dubai international airport and was welcomed by her husband, then whisked off in a silver Bentley to her family villa in an upscale Dubai neighborhood overlooking a lake and a golf course.
Bhutto, wearing a traditional, rose-colored Pakistani dress and white headscarf, was greeted in the yard of the villa by her daughters and staff. In Pakistan's northwest district of Swat, the militants attacked law-enforcement posts before dawn Thursday, and security forces responded with fire from mortars, small arms and helicopter gunships.
Some 2,500 security forces have been deployed to the area to pursue followers of Maulana Fazlullah, a cleric seeking to enforce Taliban-style rule.
"According to the information I have from police and Frontier Constabulary, between 60 to 70 miscreants were killed in Swat's areas of Khawaza Khela today," army spokesman Maj. Gen. Waheed Arshad said. Sirajuddin, a spokesman for Fazlullah who goes by one name, denied that, saying only one or two militants died. He claimed that 40 security forces had surrendered in fighting in Khawaza Khela.
Sirajuddin also said two foreigners had been captured by militants in the same area, but that he could not confirm reports that they were journalists or give their nationalities.
Opposition leader Benazir Bhutto, seen by many supporters as key to a possible return to democratic rule, flew out of Pakistan to visit family in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, two weeks after she was targeted by assassins upon her return from eight years in exile.
Terror attacks and clashes between militants and President Gen. Pervez Musharraf's security forces have deepened the political turmoil ahead of a Supreme Court ruling on whether Musharraf's sweeping Oct. 6 presidential victory was constitutional. There are fears he could impose a state of emergency if judges rule against him, jeopardizing the country's transition to civilian rule. "She has gone to Dubai to see her ailing mother and children," Bhutto's spokesman Farhatullah Babar said Thursday afternoon after the former prime minister was seen stepping onto an Emirates plane in Karachi. "She will come back on Nov. 8."
Bhutto landed at the Dubai international airport and was welcomed by her husband, then whisked off in a silver Bentley to her family villa in an upscale Dubai neighborhood overlooking a lake and a golf course.
Bhutto, wearing a traditional, rose-colored Pakistani dress and white headscarf, was greeted in the yard of the villa by her daughters and staff. In Pakistan's northwest district of Swat, the militants attacked law-enforcement posts before dawn Thursday, and security forces responded with fire from mortars, small arms and helicopter gunships.
Some 2,500 security forces have been deployed to the area to pursue followers of Maulana Fazlullah, a cleric seeking to enforce Taliban-style rule.
"According to the information I have from police and Frontier Constabulary, between 60 to 70 miscreants were killed in Swat's areas of Khawaza Khela today," army spokesman Maj. Gen. Waheed Arshad said. Sirajuddin, a spokesman for Fazlullah who goes by one name, denied that, saying only one or two militants died. He claimed that 40 security forces had surrendered in fighting in Khawaza Khela.
Sirajuddin also said two foreigners had been captured by militants in the same area, but that he could not confirm reports that they were journalists or give their nationalities.
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