Fatal bomb attack in Pakistan militant hotbed

AFP - A bomb attack killed 12 people in a Pakistan market Thursday as Islamabad raised fresh concerns to the United States about knock-on instability caused by a major anti-Taliban assault in Afghanistan.
  
The bomb exploded in a remote area under control of rival Islamist militant factions in Khyber, through which NATO supplies its troops in Afghanistan and part of the lawless tribal belt branded by Washington an Al-Qaeda headquarters.
  
The explosion damaged a mosque and a few shops, killing a militant commander and 11 other people in Dars village of Upper Tirah valley, in what security officials said could be a feud between rival Islamist factions.
  
"Twelve people were killed and more than 30 injured in the bomb blast, we are still not sure about the nature of the blast," an intelligence officer in the northwestern city of Peshawar told AFP by telephone.
  
"We have confirmed reports that militant commander Azam (Khan of Lashkar-e-Islam) was also killed in the blast," the officer added.
  
One local administration official said the bomb exploded as about 80 people were gathered around the mosque, bazaar and cattle market, also near a base of Lashkar-e-Islam, a militant group with some ideological ties to the Taliban.
  
Lashkar-e-Islam -- which means Army of Islam -- has staged bombings in the past and is the target of a Pakistani military operation to oust it from Khyber, but intelligence officials blamed warring extremist factions.
  
"There are two militant groups fighting with each other in Tirah valley. Both of them are attacking each other. There is a possibility that the rival group attacked the Lashkar-e-Islam base," one intelligence official said.
  
Another official suggested the bombing could be a revival of a feud between Lashkar-e-Islam and rivals Ansar-ul-Islam, which means Companions of Islam.
  
Islamist militants have orchestrated a deadly bombing campaign to avenge the Pakistan government's alliance with the United States in the "war on terror". Their attacks have killed more than 3,000 people since July 2007.
  
Pakistan's civilian government on Thursday raised fresh concerns to visiting US envoy Richard Holbrooke about Afghan refugees and fighters fleeing a major US-led offensive designed to capture a key Taliban stronghold in Afghanistan.
  
Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani raised the matter in talks with Holbrooke, who arrived in Islamabad on Thursday following talks in Afghanistan.
  
About 15,000 Afghan, US and NATO troops are conducting Operation Mushtarak (Together) in southern Afghanistan against about 400 to 1,000 Taliban fighters in what has been billed as the biggest assault since the 2001 US-led invasion.
  
The offensive is targeting a major drug-producing area in Helmand province, which borders Pakistan's insurgency-rife Baluchistan province.
  
Gilani expressed hope that "Pakistan’s concerns on account of spillover of refugees and militants from Helmand into southwestern Baluchistan and the northwest will be kept in view by the US and ISAF forces," his office said.
  
He called for "enhanced coordination and cooperation" with Pakistan's armed forces to deal with the situation.
  
The United States has hailed the capture in Pakistan of the Taliban military commander Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, whose arrest could deal a blow to the militia's eight-year war in Afghanistan.
  
President Barack Obama's administration has called on Pakistan to place greater urgency on the fight against extremism as the United States pours 30,000 more troops into Afghanistan to fight Al-Qaeda and Taliban extremists.
  
The involvement in the arrest of Pakistan -- suspected by the West of supporting the Taliban in Afghanistan -- could also herald a new era in US efforts to persuade Islamabad to move aggressively against Islamist networks.
  
Pakistan's relationship with the United States has been clouded by mutual suspicion and has proved unpopular among an increasingly anti-American Pakistani populace.