Pakistani commandos dropped into a key Taliban stronghold in the Swat valley yesterday, stepping up a punishing offensive against militants that has displaced more than 360,000 people.
Troops opened up a new front in the district’s northern mountains, the suspected stronghold of firebrand Taliban commander Maulana Fazlullah and his top lieutenants behind a nearly two-year uprising that has devastated the area.
Military officials said “heliborne troops” landed at Peochar, about 65km northwest of the main Swat town of Mingora, in the first such assault during the latest offensive to crush the Taliban in the district.
PHOTO: AP
“The operation is right now in progress,” one of the officials said from the northwest region.
Attack helicopters also shelled suspected Taliban hideouts in Malam Jabba, once frequented for its pristine winter ski slopes, a military official said.
Pakistani ground and air forces have been pounding Taliban strongholds across the northwest for 16 days in what Islamabad says is a fight to eliminate militant — branded by Washington as the greatest terror threat to the West.
Military officials have released death tolls that combine to more than 780 dead militants but are not independently verifiable.
Rights groups have called on Pakistan to avoid civilian casualties and local doctors who have fled the onslaught say Swat’s main hospital is closed and that the wounded cannot be treated with no electricity.
“Beheadings and use of human shields by Taliban forces are not a blank check for the Pakistani army,” Human Rights Watch Asia division director Brad Adams said.
“Winning the war but also the peace in Swat can only be achieved by minimizing civilian suffering,” Adams said.
The US-based group said it received reports of civilian deaths and destruction of property in the aerial bombardment, but that because the area was a closed military zone it was impossible to verify the information.
It also quoted reports from those fleeing that the Taliban had mined parts of the valley and were preventing people from leaving — “effectively using the people there as human shields to deter military attack.”
The military has relied heavily on helicopter gunships, fighter jets and artillery during the offensive, which critics argue will maximize the risk of collateral damage.
Ahmad Ali, 24, said by telephone that armed Taliban were prowling the streets of Mingora.
“I’ve never even a single soldier during curfew hours in the city and only armed Taliban are seen patrolling streets,” he said. “Taliban fire mortars on security forces from heavy guns.”
The military said last week that between 12,000 and 15,000 security forces were operating against 4,000 well-armed Taliban fighters in Swat, once a ski resort popular with Westerners but ravaged by the advancing Taliban menace.
Security officials said Pakistani troops killed eight militants in Lower Dir district, where troops were using helicopter gunships and artillery yesterday.
It is difficult for reliable and independent information on developments to filter across the frontlines, as many local journalists have reportedly fled.
The UN refugee agency said more than 360,000 displaced people had registered after escaping the worst-affected districts of Buner, Lower Dir and Swat, although the UN feared the numbers could be much higher.
“This is a huge and rapidly unfolding emergency, which is going to require considerable resources beyond those that currently exist in the region,” UN High Commissioner for Refugees Antonio Guterres said.
The agency was to begin an airlift Tuesday ferrying 120 tonnes of supplies.
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