A US drone strike targeting a militant compound in Pakistan'snorthwestern tribal area killed 15 insurgents in a pre-dawn attackon Monday, security officials said. Two missiles were fired on the compound in Mir Ali, 25 kilometres(15 miles) east of Miranshah, the capital of North Waziristan, nearthe Afghan border, in an area considered a hive of Taliban andAl-Qaeda activity. The attack was the eighth drone strike in Pakistan since a NATOconference on Afghanistan in Chicago last month. "Fifteen militants were killed in a dawn strike on a compound. Thebodies of those killed were unable to be identified," a securityofficial in Miranshah told AFP. He said there were reports that some foreigners had been killed butthese were unable to be confirmed. A security official in Peshawar confirmed the attack and said 15militants were killed. "We have received reports that 15 militants have been killed in adrone strike but at this moment we don't know about theirnationalities," the official said. "We are also unclear about the number of the militants who werepresent in the compound at the time of attack." The latest attack came amid an uptick in drone strikes. An attackon Sunday killed at least five insurgents, including a commander,near Wana -- the main town in South Waziristan, security officialssaid. Washington considers Pakistan's semi-autonomous northwestern tribalbelt the main hub of Taliban and Al-Qaeda militants plottingattacks on the West and in Afghanistan. Pakistani-US relations went into freefall last year when a CIAcontractor shot dead two Pakistanis, an American raid killedAl-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden, and US air strikes in Novemberkilled 24 Pakistani soldiers. After the air strikes, Pakistan shut its Afghan border to NATOsupplies and ordered US staff out of an air base reportedly used asa hub for drones. In March, Pakistan's parliament agreed to reset US relations oncondition that Washington apologise for the troops' deaths and enddrone attacks on its soil. Pakistan has been incensed by Washington's refusal to apologise forthe November air strikes and US officials have so far rejectedPakistani proposals to charge several thousand dollars for eachalliance truck crossing the border. Islamabad, which is understood to have given its tacit approval forattacks on Al-Qaeda and Taliban targets in the past, has becomeincreasingly vocal in its opposition to the perceived violation ofnational sovereignty. Despite Pakistani criticism US officials are believed to considerthe drone attacks too useful to stop them altogether. They haveargued that the strikes are a valuable weapon in the war againstIslamist militants. According to an AFP tally, 45 US missile strikes were reported inPakistan's tribal belt in 2009, the year US President Barack Obamatook office, 101 in 2010 and 64 in 2011. The New America Foundation think-tank in Washington says dronestrikes have killed between 1,715 and 2,680 people in Pakistan inthe past eight years. We are high quality suppliers, our products such as Steel Wire Cable Tray Manufacturer , Basket Cable Tray Manufacturer for oversee buyer. To know more, please visits Wire Cable Tray.
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