18 more militants killed in NWA air strikes

MIRANSHAH: The PAF fighter jets continued air strikes in the Shawal Valley of the North Waziristan Agency for the third consecutive day on Tuesday in which military authorities said 18 more militants were killed.
The Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) in a statement said that fighter jets pounded militants’ hideouts in the far-off mountainous Shawal Valley near the Afghan border. It said that terrorists’ sanctuaries were targeted and destroyed during the bombing raids carried out on intelligence information. Military officials said those killed included foreign militants.
The number of militants who were killed during three days of air strikes has risen to more than 100.While two different militant groups, the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan Jamaatul Ahrar (TTP-JA), which is reportedly based in Afghanistan’s Nangarhar province near the border with Pakistan’s Mohmand tribal region, and Lashkar-e-Islam, which is also believed to be operating from the border areas between Pakistan and Afghanistan, have claimed responsibility for the suicide attack on Punjab Home Minister Colonel (retd) Shuja Khanzada in Attock on Sunday, the military has stepped up air strikes in the Shawal Valley of North Waziristan.
Majority of the local and foreign militants had fled to the Shawal Valley and Dattakhel area of North Waziristan after the government conducted a massive offensive against them in the residential areas of Mir Ali and Miranshah.
Unlike Mir Ali and Miranshah, security forces could not carry out a ground offensive against the militants in the Shawal Valley due to difficult terrain and inaccessibility. Some of the militants had occupied bunkers and observation posts which security forces had vacated before the launch of the military operation Zarb-e-Azb on June 15, 2014.