Eighteen killed as fighting resumes in Pakistan valley (Roundup)

Oct 31, 2007, 17:42 GMT

Islamabad - At least 18 pro-Taliban militants were killed on Wednesday as military gunship helicopters and artillery fire pounded their hideouts following the collapse of a two-day ceasefire in Pakistan's south-west volatile Swat valley, officials said.

'The insurgents fired several rockets on Matta police station on Tuesday night and the security forces are retaliating by targeting their positions in the surrounding mountains,' a local police officer told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa on condition of anonymity.

The official said the rebels were also using heavy weapons, including mortar guns, in the clashes.

'Eighteen to nineteen insurgents were killed,' said military spokesman Major General Waheed Arshad, adding that the action was taken because the insurgents were terrorizing people in the area.

However, the militants' spokesman Maulvi Shah said only three civilians, including a woman, died in the fresh firefight. Neither of the claims could independently be confirmed.

The temporary truce was reached on Monday following three days of bloody clashes between the government forces and the armed supporters of firebrand cleric Maulana Fazlullah that left dozens of militants, security officers and civilians dead.

Fazlullah, 32, has used an illegal radio station to galvanize massive public support for his efforts to enforce Taliban rule in the scenic valley, located some 160 kilometres from the North-West Frontier Province (NWFP) capital Peshawar.

Islamabad deployed an additional 2,500 troops last week to curb the Islamic rebellion but the move was responded to with a deadly suicide attack on a paramilitary truck that killed two dozen people, including 19 soldiers.

The Islamic uprising in Swat emanates from the rapid spread of radical Islam into the settled area of NWFP from tribal areas, where al-Qaeda and Taliban fighters fled after US-led international forces invaded Afghanistan in late 2001.