Pakistan troops battle for key city in Swat Valley

The battle for the crucial Swat Valley city of Mingora began Saturday as Pakistani troops waged fierce street combat with Taliban militants and began the most difficult test yet in the monthlong offensive to regain much of northwest Pakistan from insurgents.

Pakistani security forces so far have been able to root out Taliban fighters from districts surrounding the Swat Valley, as well as mountain ridges and towns within the district, where the militants recently won the right to impose Sharia, or Islamic law.

In Islamabad, the Pakistani capital, military spokesman Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas said 1,095 militants had been killed and 29 captured during the offensive. The death toll could not be independently verified.

Mingora poses a major challenge for Pakistani troops, facing fighters deeply embedded in an urban environment who have mines, fortifications and hidden weapons caches. The fight will also be complicated by the presence of as many as 20,000 civilians who stayed behind when the rest of the city’s population of 375,000 fled.

A heavy civilian toll could wither support for the offensive. The military has won backing from large segments of the population despite the massive humanitarian crisis created by the exodus from the battle zone. Nearly 2 million displaced people have sought shelter in tent camps outside the conflict zone or in the homes of relatives or friends.

In announcing the Mingora campaign, Abbas said soldiers had driven Taliban fighters out of sections of the city and surrounding areas and had discovered three caves that they used to hide arms and rations.

“The clearance of Mingora has commenced,” Abbas said. “The pace of the operation will be painfully slow. So keep patient. But the operation has started and, God willing, we are going to take it to the logical conclusion.”

Abbas said that elsewhere in Swat, security forces were retaking Taliban strongholds. Pakistani troops have secured the town of Matta, where an extensive network of insurgent tunnels was found, and have begun to push fighters out of the Swat Valley town of Peochar. Taliban militants have been fleeing the Peochar area in small groups, Abbas said.

Authorities have largely barred journalists from Swat, making it difficult to verify the statements about the offensive. And if neighboring Afghanistan is any guide, Taliban fighters may melt away in the face of army campaigns, only to return, or create new strongholds elsewhere.

It remains to be seen whether the military’s gains in Swat and surrounding districts lead to an expansion of the offensive into the volatile tribal areas, along the border with Afghanistan. Pakistan’s president, Asif Ali Zardari, has said that the Waziristan region, where the Pakistani Taliban has established a stronghold, could be the next target.

Security forces clashed Saturday with militants in South Waziristan, where they directed artillery fire at Taliban positions in the Mehsud area. Rocket fire from militants wounded six children in residential areas, hospital officials said.

But Prime Minister Yusaf Raza Gillani said he doubted that the offensive would be expanded to include areas such as Waziristan. “It’s not like this,” he told reporters Saturday. “We are not foolish to do it everywhere.”

alex.rodriguez@latimes.com

Special correspondent Zulfiqar Ali in Peshawar, Pakistan, contributed to this report.