Missile Strike in Pakistan Kills 10 At Suspected Taliban Safe House

By Imtiaz Ali and Candace Rondeaux
Washington Post Foreign Service
Friday, February 29, 2008; A14

PESHAWAR, Pakistan, Feb. 28 -- A missile strike on a suspected Taliban safe house in a remote tribal area of northwest Pakistan killed at least 10 people early Thursday, according to residents and local officials.

The attack targeted a home in the village of Kaloosha in volatile South Waziristan, near the Afghan border. There were conflicting reports on the number of casualties and the identities of those killed, but local residents and officials said the home belonged to a farm owner who had recently offered it as a guesthouse to several foreign fighters.

Accounts of how the attack unfolded were also mixed. Several residents said they heard three explosions at about 2 a.m. One of the missiles apparently missed its target, while two others destroyed the house. A tribal leader in South Waziristan, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter, said that women and children were among the dead, and that at least six others were injured.

The attack, less than 20 miles from the Afghan border, marked the second targeted missile strike in a month in the rugged mountainous region, a key battleground in Pakistan's fight with the Taliban and al-Qaeda. Thirteen people, including top al-Qaeda lieutenant Abu Laith al-Libi, were killed Jan. 29 in an airstrike in the village of Khushali Torikhel in North Waziristan.

The United States is officially barred from conducting operations in Pakistan, but it has launched several aerial attacks in the country's tribal areas, including the one that killed Libi, according to U.S. intelligence sources.

In Washington, U.S. intelligence officials declined to comment on Thursday's attack.

A Pakistani army spokesman said he had no information about the incident, and officials with the Interior Ministry could not be reached for comment.

A local official in the Pakistani town of Wana, near the site of the strike, said 10 people were killed, but he could not confirm their identities or the number of injured. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly on the matter, said Pakistani security forces began monitoring the area recently after receiving reports that several foreign fighters had been sighted.

According to local residents, Sher Mohammed Malikkheil, the owner of the home, is a member of the Yargulkhel, a sub-tribe of the Wazir, the predominant tribe in South Waziristan. A farmer by profession, Malikkheil, also known as Sheroo, has been suspected of links to local and foreign fighters.

"Sheroo's house has been home to some outsiders and strange people for the last few months and he himself was living in another home," said Shah Nazar, a shop owner in the neighboring village of Azam Warsak.

Kaloosha has long been considered a stronghold of foreign and local fighters with ties to al-Qaeda. The village was home to Nek Mohammed, a commander who was killed in an apparent missile strike in June 2004 after sheltering hundreds of al-Qaeda fighters following the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan in 2001. The Taliban, an extremist Islamic militia, ruled most of Afghanistan before the invasion and provided a haven to al-Qaeda.

Mufti Jan Amir, a Taliban commander with close ties to top Pakistani militants in Wana, said all those killed in Thursday's attack were Afghans who had lived in the area for years.

Rondeaux reported from Islamabad. Staff writer Joby Warrick in Washington contributed to this report.