'Sanitisation' of Shawal Valley in progress, another 21 terrorists killed: ISPR
Ground forces to continue to hunt fleeing terrorists in Shawal Valley.
RAWALPINDI (Web Desk / AFP) – Another 21 terrorists have been killed since last night in air and ground operations in the restive northwest region along the Afghan border, an army spokesperson reported on Tuesday.
According to DG ISPR Lt Gen Asim Saleem Bajwa, Pakistan Air Force (PAF) and Army aviation carried out combined air strikes while ground forces continue to hunt fleeing terrorists in Shawal Valley.
The army spokesperson said that 21 terrorists have been killed since last night while important heights and passes near Pak-Afghan border have been secured. Sanitisation of Shawal Valley is in progress, he added.
Army men busy in operation in Shawal
Last month, Army Chief General Raheel Sharif had given the order to launch the final phase of Operation Zarb-e-Azb in North Waziristan, one of the tribal areas on the border with Afghanistan in which militants had previously operated with impunity.
A senior security official had told AFP that the push in the southern pockets of Shawal and Data Khel began "a couple of days ago", with warm weather melting the snow covering the mountainous terrain.
"Both ground and air assets are being used to take on the terrorists hiding in the areas," the source told AFP on condition of anonymity.
"The objective is to cleanse the area of militants," he said, adding he could give no further details for security reasons.
The army launched the operation in mid-2014, in a bid to wipe out militant bases in the North Waziristan tribal area and bring an end to the near decade-long insurgency that has cost Pakistan thousands of lives.
The operation was intensified after the Taliban massacred more than 150 people, the majority of them children, at a school in the northwestern city of Peshawar in December 2014.
Security has improved noticeably in Pakistan since the operation was launched, with militancy-related violence in 2015 dropping to its lowest level since 2007, the year the Tehreek-e-Taliban was formed.
A second senior security official told AFP that the military also plans to step up intelligence-based anti-militant operations in Pakistan’s cities.
Such operations are already underway in major cities like Karachi, but he said they will "now be intensified to clear our cities of militants forever".
The military says it has killed more than 3,600 insurgents in the tribal zone, with 358 soldiers having lost their lives. Observers caution that many other militants have crossed over the border into Afghanistan.
