US drone strikes resume in Pakistan as diplomat row drags on

Missiles fired from unmanned aircraft at suspected militant training centre in main town in South Waziristan, say officials, as US diplomat charged with murder stays in jail.

DERA ISMAIL KHAN // A US drone strike killed at least seven people yesterday in a region along Pakistan's western border, local officials said, the first such attack in a month as a diplomatic feud strains US-Pakistani ties.

At least four missiles were fired from the unmanned aircraft at a suspected militant training centre in the main town in the South Waziristan tribal agency, intelligence officials in South Waziristan said.

"According to initial reports there were foreigners among the dead," one of the officials said.

A second official said the foreign nationals killed included three people from Turkmenistan and two Arab nationals.

It is the first time since January 23 that intelligence officials have reported a US drone attack, marking a resumption of a campaign that has become the centrepiece of US efforts to halt militants launching attacks on its soldiers in Afghanistan.

Many analysts believe Washington halted the attacks for weeks to avoid further inflaming anti-American sentiment in Pakistan as it pressures Islamabad to release Raymond Davis, a US consulate employee imprisoned after he shot two Pakistanis last month in what he said was an attempted robbery.

Some analysts speculate the pause was due to poor weather or an inability to find reliable targets as militants hunt down Pakistanis they believe are feeding intelligence information.

Washington, which provides Pakistan with billions of dollars a year in military and civilian aid, is leaning hard on the government of Asif Ali Zardari to release Mr Davis, on the grounds that he has diplomatic immunity.

Yet neither can the government afford to irritate Pakistanis who are upset about the shooting incident. Protesters have burned US flags and demanded that Mr Davis be tried for murder in local courts.

Yesterday, a Pakistani intelligence official said Mr Davis was an undercover CIA contractor.

Washington insists Mr Davis, who says he acted in self-defence, is a member of its Islamabad embassy's "administrative and technical staff" who has diplomatic immunity and should be released immediately.

But the unpopular government in Pakistan is under huge pressure from the political opposition not to cave in to US demands, with analysts even warning that the case could bring down the ruling Pakistan People's Party.

"It is beyond any shadow of a doubt that he was working for CIA," an official from Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency said.

"He's on contract. He's not a regular CIA guy, but he's working for CIA. That's confirmed," the official said.

Mr Davis is in a jail in Lahore after a hearing on his immunity was delayed until March 14.

Talat Masood, a retired Pakistani general and military analyst, said the United States may have resumed the drone raids because Mr Davis's case may take a long time to resolve.

The strikes, which are not publicly acknowledged by either country, are another delicate situation for the Zardari government, battling an insurgency of its own and struggling to hold together a fragile coalition.

The attacks are seen as a risk and a necessity for Pakistan, which is under pressure from its chief ally in the West to fight militants but faces mounting resentment from Pakistanis who criticise the government for bowing to US wishes.

There is also growing debate about the effectiveness of the strikes, which have killed al Qa'eda and Taliban figures but have been unable to reach senior militants living in cities such as Quetta and Karachi that Pakistan has made off-limits to strikes.

According to a report in The Washington Post, only two of the drone attacks in Pakistan last year killed militants who were senior enough to appear on a US most-wanted list.

* Reuters, with additional reporting by Agence France-Presse