Pakistani official says al Qaeda no longer in tribal border area

KARAVAN MANZA, Pakistan – Pakistani security forces have eliminated al Qaeda-linked militants from a mountainous tribal region bordering Afghanistan after months of gunbattles that killed hundreds on both sides, a senior Pakistan army commander said Saturday.

Maj. Gen. Niaz Khattak, who is leading the hunt for militants in South Waziristan, said as many as 600 militants were in the region last year.

“According to our intelligence reports, now we think there is absolutely none in South Waziristan,” Khattak told journalists at the Karavan Manza mountaintop army bunker during an organized tour of the northwestern region.

On Saturday, two Pakistan army helicopters brought the journalists to Karavan Manza, a 7,000-foot peak with a stone bunker. They were shown an al Qaeda training facility and hide-outs that were captured June 2004 in a bloody operation.

Hundreds of al Qaeda militants – possibly including the group’s leader, Osama bin Laden – poured across the Afghan border into the Pakistani tribal regions after the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan in 2001 following the Sept. 11 attacks.

In a briefing at the army post, Khattak said the mountain was at the center of several months of fighting. Soldiers captured the bases and destroyed the militants’ communication system in Karavan Manza, he said.

Pakistani forces killed 306 suspected al Qaeda-linked terrorists and their local supporters, while 250 soldiers died in the campaign, Khattak said.