Bombers Kill 19 and Wound Dozens in NW Pakistan

Two suicide bombers attacked pro-government tribesmen and security forces Thursday in Pakistan's volatile northwest, killing at least 19 people and wounding dozens, officials said.

Local residents gather around a damaged portion of a bridge wrecked by militants with explosive...

Local residents gather around a damaged portion of a bridge wrecked by militants with explosive early Wednesday morning, Nov. 5, 2008, on the outskirts of Mangora, the main town of Pakistan's Swat Valley. Pakistani security forces have been fighting militants in country's various parts of the border region since August. (AP Photo/Sherin Zada)

(AP)

The separate attacks came in a region where the Pakistani military has clashed for months with Islamic insurgents allied with Taliban and al-Qaida militants who are involved in attacks on American and NATO troops in neighboring Afghanistan.

U.S. officials have praised Pakistan for getting tougher on militants, but the offensives have escalated extremist bloodshed in the Muslim nation where anti-American sentiment runs deep.

The first suicide attacker killed 17 people and wounded 40 at a gathering of tribesmen in a militia formed to combat insurgents, government and hospital officials said. A purported spokesman for a Taliban-linked group claimed responsibility for the attack.

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Late Thursday, another suicide bomber rammed his vehicle into a checkpoint manned by security forces near a police compound in the Swat Valley, killing at least two paramilitary troopers and wounding at least 20 other people, officials said.

Pakistan launched an offensive in Bajur three months ago to dismantle what it said was a virtual Taliban mini-state from where militants were flowing into Afghanistan.

Salarzai tribesmen were preparing to stage an assault on local militant hide-outs when the suicide bomber struck, said Iqbal Khattak, a government official. Malik Rahimullah, a tribal elder, said the bomb exploded as soon as the armed tribesmen began to move.

Witnesses said they saw a young man rush into the crowd before the explosion.

Amir Khan, a tribesman, said that the scene was littered with severed limbs and that several tribal elders who were instrumental in starting the militia were among the dead.

Khattak said 11 bodies were taken to the main hospital in Khar, the area's main city. Mohammad Kareem, a hospital official, said later that at least six of some 45 wounded people had died and that more than a dozen of the remaining injured were in serious condition.