Pakistan troops reported to have fled border outpost

DOZENS of Pakistani troops are understood to have fled an outpost near the border with Afghanistan yesterday after receiving threats from Taleban militants who a day earlier overran a nearby fort.

If reports are confirmed, it would raise questions about the central government's ability to control the border area, where Taleban and al-Qaeda fighters are responsible for rising attacks in both Pakistan and Afghanistan.

An intelligence official said the paramilitary troops fled the roadside post without a fight after the militants warned them to leave or face attack.

Maulvi Mohammed Umar, a purported militant spokesman, said the troops surrendered after 500 fighters surrounded the post. "We released them (the troops) under the spirit of Islam," he said. "The Taleban have now hoisted their white flag on the fort."

A resident in Jandola said the troops had abandoned the post, citing accounts from other tribesmen who had seen it.

Militants overran the nearby Sararogha Fort in South Waziristan late on Tuesday in a battle that left seven soldiers dead and at least 15 troops missing. The British colonial-era fort, which the militants have since abandoned, is one of a string of positions held by the paramilitary Frontier Constabulary along Pakistan's porous border with Afghanistan.

The militants took it after blowing a hole in one of its walls.

In violence following that defeat, mortars killed at least four civilians and wounded 13 others according to eyewitnesses and an intelligence official.

"We don't care if Taleban and the security forces fight each other, but they should look out for the local population and avoid indiscriminate shelling which is hitting homes and killing innocent women and children," said Noor Muhammad, a Kotakai villager.

The government says the militants are intent on destabilising the country in the run-up to a 18 February general election that is meant to complete a transition to civilian rule.

The parliamentary elections were due to be held on 8 January but were postponed after former prime minister Benazir Bhutto was killed.

Militants flocked to Waziristan and other parts of the Afghan-Pakistani border in the 1980s to support Afghan guerrillas fighting Soviet troops in Afghanistan.

Many al-Qaeda and Taleban members took refuge on the Pakistani side of the border after US-led troops ousted the Taleban in Afghanistan in late 2001. They now launch raids into Afghanistan from border sanctuaries.

Meanwhile yesterday, a suicide bomber blew himself up at a Shiite mosque in Peshawar in north-western Pakistan, killing at least nine people and injuring 25 others.

One witness said he heard gunshots just before the blast. "People are crying and shouting. It's chaos," said Ali Haider, who was outside the hall when the attack took place.

Pakistan's minority Shiites are observing a mourning period for the anniversary of the death of Iman Hussein, a grandson of the Prophet Muhammad. During this period sectarian violence often flares.

It could be a conspiracy to spread religious hatred, to pit Muslim against Muslim," said Ghulam Ali, a district government chief in the city.

While Sunni and Shiite Pakistanis live together peacefully, radicals from the two sects have inflicted a bloody toll in assassinations and bomb attacks..

HARD-LINER WHO IS PUBLIC ENEMY NO 1

THE insurgents who seized the Sararogha Fort are believed to be followers of Baitullah Mehsud, an Islamic hard-liner who, since December, has been sole leader of an umbrella group of Taleban sympathisers and who is also thought to have links to al-Qaeda.

President Pervez Musharraf has blamed Mehsud and another pro-Taleban cleric, Mullah Fazlullah, for about 20 suicide attacks that have killed 400 people in three months.

Mehsud, labelled public enemy No 1 by the government, also masterminded the brazen capture of 213 Pakistani soldiers last August. The government was humiliated when the militants released video footage of the captured men.

"The militants are now challenging the army openly. They have become very bold and are consolidating their positions," political analyst Talat Masood, a retired general, said.

Mr Musharraf first deployed the army in Pakistan's semi-autonomous tribal regions along the frontier in late 2001 to chase down al-Qaeda militants fleeing the US-led invasion of Afghanistan. Since then, they have met with mixed success, amid some allegations that the militants enjoy sympathy from powerful forces within Pakistan's government.