Missile strike in Pakistan kills al Qaeda suspect

BY ZAHID HUSSAIN
AND YOCHI J. DREAZEN

A U.S. missile strike in a remote area of Pakistan last week killed a top al Qaeda planner suspected of involvement in attacks targeting Europe, according to Pakistani and U.S. officials.

The strike killed al Qaeda operative Abu Suleiman al Jaziery and at least 14 others, the officials said. Some of the dead were civilians, according to a senior Pakistani official and a pair of U.S. officials familiar with the attack. The strike has been reported, but Mr. Jaziery hadn't previously been identified as the primary target.

The strike took place in the tribal region of Bajaur, along Pakistan's porous border with Afghanistan and an area believed to be a haven for al Qaeda and Taliban militants.

It comes amid rising tensions between the administration of U.S. President George W. Bush and Pakistan's new civilian government, which is working to finalize a truce with Islamist militants in the country's largely lawless tribal regions.

Pakistani officials believe the U.S: backed strategy of confronting the extremists militarily has failed to achieve any clear results, and they say they want to place greater emphasis on the social and economic development of the tribal regions. Pakistani leaders also s盯the peace talks involve tribal leaders, not militants.

"We will only talk to those who abandon militancy," Pakistani Prime Minister Youssef Raza Gillani said in an interview.

The pending cease-fire is viewed with alarm by many U.S. officials, who fear it will give the militants a free hand to reconstitute their ranks and step up their attacks against Western forces in neighboring Afghanistan.

Violence in Afghanistan has surged recently, and some officials from the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, which maintains about 30,000 troops in Afghanistan, blame the increase on the Pakistani government's decision to curtail military operations in the tribal areas.

U.S. officials have stepped up their own efforts against extremists inside Pakistan. So far this year, unmanned U.S. aerial drones have carried out at least four missile strikes on targets in Pakistan, officials said. The drones have been operated by the Central Intelligence Agency, according to the omcials.

Mr. Jaziery had been hiding in a suspected al Qaeda safe house in the village of Damadola. The Pakistani official said U.S. drones destroyed the house with a pair of Predator missiles, killing the militant and more than a dozen others.

The May 14 attack provoked widespread protests within Pakistan, and Pakistani military authorities said they weren't given any advance notice.

It wasn't the first time the U.S. attacked the village. In early 2006, U.S. drones fired missiles at Damadola after the CIA received word that Ayman al-Zawahiri, the top deputy to al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, was attending a dinner there. The strike killed approximately 18 people, including several top al Qaeda officials, but Mr. Zawahiri wasn't among them and remains at large.