At least three militants were killed Monday in a missile strike by suspected US drones on a Pakistan tribal town near the Afghan border, security and local officials said.

The drones fired several missiles that hit a house near a madrassa or Islamic seminary in North Waziristan, the officials said, in the fourth such strike in the rugged tribal region in almost a week.

"It killed three militants and wounded 15 others," a security official said.

Residents and hospital officials said the wounded included women and children.

The drones were apparently targeting the house or the madrassa which was established by former Taliban commander Jalaluddin Haqqani, during the 1978-88 Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, residents said.

Haqqani, who was a close aid of fugitive Taliban leader Mullah Omar, has not been seen since the fall of the hardline Taliban regime in Afghanistan.

Residents said two pilotless aircraft circled over Dande Darpakhel, three kilometres (about a mile) north of the region's main town of Miranshah before at least one drone fired several missiles one after the other.

On Friday, three children and two women were killed in the same region during a suspected strike by a pilotless aircraft.

At least five militants were also killed the day before when a missile fired from an unmanned plane hit a house in the North Waziristan village of Mohammad Khel, officials said.

The latest strike follows Pakistani claims that US-led forces based in Afghanistan killed 15 people in a border village in neighbouring South Waziristan district last week.

South Waziristan is a known haven for Taliban and Al-Qaeda militants.

Missile strikes targeting militants in Pakistan in recent weeks have been blamed on US-led coalition forces or CIA drones based in Afghanistan. Pakistan does not have missile-equipped drones.

US and Afghan officials say Pakistan's tribal areas are a safe haven for Al-Qaeda and Taliban militants who sneaked into the rugged terrain after the fall of the Taliban regime in late 2001.