Airstrikes kill 15 in Pakistan

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KHAR, (Pakistan), Nov 6 (Agencies): An airstrike killed 15 militants in northwestern Pakistan, while two rockets landed near the region's main airport, officials said Thursday.
The Pakistani military strike late Wednesday hit a compound in Airab, a village in the semiautonomous Bajur region that borders Afghanistan.
Jamil Khan, the No. 2 government representative in Bajur, said the 15 dead included a Pakistani militant commander named Wali Rehman. Khan claimed that Rehman was known to shelter foreign militants linked to al-Qaida.
Pakistan launched an offensive in Bajur three months ago to dismantle what they said was a virtual Taliban mini-state from where militants were flowing into Afghanistan.
The army claims to have killed some 1,500 insurgents. At least 73 troops and 95 civilians have also died, it says. Insecurity and government restrictions mean accounts of the fighting cannot be verified.
US officials praise the operation, saying it has reduced violence on the other side of the frontier.
However, militants have responded to the offensives - and to stepped up US missile strikes into other parts of Pakistan's border zone - with a wave of suicide attacks that are adding to concern about the country's stability.