Pakistan Security Brief

Pakistan Security Brief – June 30, 2009 

• A suicide bombing attack in Pakistan’s Balochistan province killed four people today. The attack struck in the town of Sohrab, nearly 200 miles from Quetta. A NATO convoy carrying supplies for troops in Afghanistan reportedly passed through the location of the bombing thirty minutes before the attacker struck.[1] 
   
• Pakistani air forces bombed areas west of Miramshah in the North Waziristan agency today, reportedly killing seven. The aerial strikes come on the heels of the recent ambush of Pakistani soldiers by militants loyal to Hafiz Gul Bahadur, breaking a truce deal. Maulvi Nazir, a militant leader in South Waziristan, also reportedly broke a truce and recently declared war on the Pakistani army.[2]
   
• A suicide bomber dressed in a burqa set-off his explosives in a border-checkpoint room used by female security guards to inspect women crossing the Afghanistan-Pakistan border at Torkham. Reported deaths after attack ranged from two to eight. On the Pakistani side of the border, in nearby Khyber agency, security forces claim to have killed more than a dozen militants after shelling suspected enemy hideouts; civilian casualties were also reported in other Khyber operations.[3]
   
• Surveillance drones have reportedly resumed flights over the FATA as part of an effort to share live video feeds, communications intercepts, and other intelligence information for military operations in Pakistan.[4]
   
• Pakistani military spokespeople claim the army killed eighteen militants and arrested two dozen more in operations throughout Malakand in the last twenty-four hours. Yesterday, a bomb blast in the Swari bazaar in Buner district injured eighteen.[5]
   
• Rival tribes in Kurram agency continued to clash yesterday as ongoing peace talks between tribal elders and political administrators continued in the area.[6]