Pakistan seizes main Taliban bases

SARAROGHA – Pakistani forces have captured most main Taliban bases in their offensive in South Waziristan and will soon fan out into the rugged countryside to hunt for militants there, commanders said yesterday.

Soldiers have advanced faster than expected in their month-long offensive, seizing main roads and Taliban bases but militant leaders have apparently melted away while their bombers have unleashed carnage in towns.The United States, weighing options for how to turn an intensifying insurgency in Afghanistan, has welcomed the offensive but is keen to see Pakistan tackle Afghan Taliban factions based in lawless enclaves along the border.Chief military spokesman Major General Athar Abbas told reporters on a trip to South Waziristan with the army that some militants might have slipped out the region but many were hiding.’We still believe many are still here. They have gone to the countryside, the forested areas, to villages and into the caves,’ Abbas said.’After taking complete control of the roads and the tracks, we are going to chase them in the forested areas, wherever they are hiding in the countryside,’ he said.More than 500 militants had been killed in the offensive since October 17 while 70 soldiers had been killed, he said.There has been no independent verification of casualties as reporters and other independent observers are not allowed into the conflict zone except on an occasional trip with the military.Highlighting fears that the militants have melted away to fight another day, the leader of the Taliban in the Swat valley, northwest of Islamabad, telephoned the BBC to say he had escaped to Afghanistan and would soon launch raids against the army.The army, which has largely cleared Swat of militants, said in July the valley’s Taliban leader, self-styled cleric Fazlullah, was believed to have been wounded. The government said in September he had been surrounded.- Nampa-Reuters