US missile strike kills 27 in S.Waziristan: officials

February 14, 2009

A suspected US missile strike destroyed a major Taliban training camp in Pakistan Saturday, killing at least 27 mainly Al-Qaeda foreign operatives, security officials said. Two missiles fired by an unmanned drone struck the camp of top Taliban commander Baitullah Mehsud in the tribal area of Ladha near the Afghan border, they said, adding Mehsud was not in the camp at the time of the strike. Two Arabs, some local Taliban and a number of Uzbeks were killed in the strike, the latest in a series of such attacks which have drawn strong protest from Pakistan. "The death toll in the twin missile strikes has jumped to 27," a senior security official told a foreign news agency, revising upward the earlier toll of 20. Mehsud heads the much feared Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and is the country's most wanted militant, accused of plotting the 2007 assassination of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto.