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Exodus from Pakistan's northwest as fighting rages
AFP - Tuesday, May 12
PESHAWAR, Pakistan (AFP) - - Pakistani forces pressed a ground and air offensive against Taliban militants on Monday in fierce fighting that has sent more than 360,000 people fleeing in just over a week.
Ground forces shelled strongholds in the Swat valley, where around 4,000 Taliban are believed to be battling for control of the former ski resort in the northwest, once popular with Westerners but now devastated by violence.
Interior Minister Rehman Malik said more than 700 militants had been killed in the northwest region as the military announced Monday that 52 "miscreants" died in exchanges of fire over the last 24 hours in Swat.
Such official tolls -- released as daily updates -- have been unverifiable and authorities have not released any information on civilian casualties.
In a sign that Islamist violence could be escalating away from the offensives against the Taliban, a suicide car bomber killed 10 people at a paramilitary checkpoint near Darra Adam Khel, south of the city of Peshawar.
"Ten people were killed. Three of them died of their injuries in hospital. And seven people are injured," an intelligence official told AFP.
Officials said a six-year-old girl and two security forces personnel were among those killed when the attacker detonated his car near the checkpost, manned by the same paramilitary soldiers engaged in the anti-Taliban campaign.
Around 12,000 to 15,000 security forces are battling Islamist fighters in three northwest districts in what Islamabad says is a fight to eliminate militants -- branded by Washington the greatest terror threat to the West.
It is difficult for reliable and independent information on developments in Swat and neighbouring Lower Dir and Buner to filter across the frontlines, as many local journalists have reportedly fled the violence.
Aid workers are stepping up assistance to displaced civilians fleeing the region in their tens of thousands on foot and crammed into clapped-out vehicles, often carrying little more than blankets and children.
Manuel Bessler, head in Pakistan of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), warned that the number of displaced could double in a long-term crisis.
"We have no doubt that the humanitarian crisis at our hands here affects a lot of people and I'm afraid will last for quite a while," he told AFP.
"It is very serious, we have a major displacement crisis," he added. "The situation is very fluid. As we speak people are on the move."
The UN refugee agency said more than 360,000 displaced had registered after escaping the worst-affected districts of Buner, Lower Dir and Swat, although OCHA feared the numbers could be much higher.
"We have to be prepared to assist up to 800,000 in addition to the already pre-existing 500,000," Bessler said.
That figure was a rough prediction from now until December, he stressed, to allow the United Nations to plan humanitarian relief.
A local Pakistani emergency response official said half a million people had fled since the latest offensives, but was unable to provide a clear date.
Another half a million fled previous bouts of fighting.
Pakistani troops have conducted operations against militants in parts of North West Frontier Province over two years, and for around six years in the surrounding semi-autonomous tribal belt on the border with Afghanistan.
The vast majority of displaced prefer to stay with relatives or rent homes away from the fighting, rather than use government-run tented encampments.
A military official said government artillery was Monday targeting militant hideouts in Swat, where an indefinite curfew is now in force.
He said small bands of militants had moved into homes abandoned by fleeing civilians, where they were hunkered down and firing on the military.
The New York Times quoted unnamed US and Pakistani intelligence officials warning that Al-Qaeda was exploiting the turmoil to strengthen its presence in nuclear-armed Pakistan and bolster militant groups.
The daily quoted its sources as saying Taliban advances in Swat and Buner, closer to Islamabad than the lawless tribal belt, have already helped Al-Qaeda in its recruiting efforts.
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