PESHAWAR, Pakistan (AFP) — Militants abducted four Pakistani paramilitary soldiers in a tribal area on Tuesday in the first such incident since the death of opposition leader Benazir Bhutto, officials said.
Militants, believed to be loyal to alleged Al-Qaeda leader Baitullah Mehsud, seized the soldiers as they descended from their observation post on a hill near Makeen in South Waziristan.
The military said five rebels had been killed and 20 others detained amid fighting following the abduction of the four soldiers.
"Troops retaliated and launched an operation supported by artillery fire," the statement said. "Security forces apprehended 20 miscreants and killed five others."
The rebels had launched rocket and mortar attacks on a military base near Ladda town from rugged terrain bordering Afghanistan, a security official said.
Several militants were injured, but were evacuated by their comrades, the official added.
A local administration official said the attackers were loyal to Mehsud, who is alleged to be an Al-Qaeda leader in Pakistan.
The kidnapping came five days after Pakistan's interior ministry accused Mehsud of involvement in the assassination of Bhutto in a gun and suicide attack in Rawalpindi.
Mehsud's spokesman has denied the allegations, saying that attacks on women are against tribal custom and tradition. He also demanded a thorough probe into Bhutto's murder.
Pakistan, a key ally in the US-led "war on terror", has deployed some 90,000 troops along the border with Afghanistan but has failed to quell the unrest.
US officials say Al-Qaeda and Taliban militants, who infiltrated Pakistan's tribal belt after the fall of the Taliban regime in Afghanistan in late 2001, have regrouped in the region.
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