Map locates South Waziristan, Pakistan and the location of suspected U.S. missile strikes
(AP)
Access to the rugged, dangerous region is strictly controlled, and the death toll could not be independently verified.
The drone attack came as U.S. Marines in neighboring Afghanistan pushed deeper in the southern Helmand province, a day after 4,000 Marines launched a major anti-Taliban offensive. Pakistan said it moved troops to the stretch of its border opposite Helmand to stop militants fleeing the American assault.
The United States wants Pakistan to crack down on militants on its side of the border, believing it essential to stabilizing Afghanistan eight years after the invasion that ousted the Taliban there.
Also Friday, U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano met government officials in the Pakistani capital, Islamabad. She discussed topics of "mutual interest" with them, a U.S. Embassy spokesman said.
The Pakistani military launched an offensive in the Swat region close to the border in early May and is currently gearing up for operations in South Waziristan to eliminate Mehsud, who has been blamed for a string of deadly suicide attacks across the country that have killed more than 100 people in the past month.
In neighboring North Waziristan on Friday, Pakistani warplanes bombed suspected militant hide-outs, killing at least four insurgents and wounding seven others, two more intelligence officials said. Those airstrikes hit targets where Taliban fighters killed 16 government troops in an ambush earlier this week, the officials said, also speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.
The U.S. appears to be ramping up the pressure on Mehsud, who is viewed in Islamabad with growing alarm. Last week, the Taliban leader narrowly escaped a strike on a funeral for militants killed in an earlier drone attack. Eighty people died in the strike, although Mehsud escaped unharmed.
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Associated Press writers Ishtiaq Mahsud in Dera Ismail Khan and Hussain Afzal in Parachinar contributed to this report.
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