Chief spokesman for Pakistan Army Maj. Gen. Shaukat Sultan told reporters in Islamabad that all eight Pakistani troops were killed when raiding a suspected militant hideout along the Afghan border.

Independent sources, however, said at least 12 soldiers were killed and 20 injured, some of them seriously.

The clash that took place in a remote tribal district brings Pakistan into direct confrontation with the ethnic Pashtun tribes living in the area.

The operation comes a day before an expected meeting between Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf and U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell in Islamabad. Powell has already said he would raise the nuclear issue and the need for stronger Pakistani actions against militants when he meets Musharraf.

Officials at the tribal secretariat in Peshawar, the capital of the northwest frontier province that borders Afghanistan, told United Press International that Pakistani troops launched the operation early Tuesday morning.

Brig. Mahmud Shah, chief administrator for the tribal zone between Afghanistan and Pakistan, told UPI authorities were tipped off that some suspected militants were hiding in a village called Kallu Shah, near Wana, the district headquarters of the South Waziristan tribal agency.

When the troops arrived, the suspects and their local supporters opened fire at the contingent. The troops returned the fire.

"And this led to the clash that continued all day," said another official. "Reinforcements were sent, and by late evening our troops ran over the enemy positions, killing 24 suspects and their sympathizers. Some people have also been arrested but we do not have details yet."

Traditionally in Pakistan names of officials telling journalists about a military operation are not disclosed unless it's an official briefing by the army's press office.

The officials who spoke with UPI by telephone also said the troops brought the bodies of at least two foreigners, perhaps Arabs, who were among the suspects.

U.S. officials believe that senior Taliban and al-Qaida leaders, including the network's chief Osama bin Laden, are hiding in the tribal belt that divides Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Last week, U.S. troops launched a major operation on the Afghan side of the border and Powell pressed Pakistan Monday for stronger action against Taliban and al-Qaida remnants in their part of the tribal territory.

"We want to see if they can do a better job of apprehending Taliban persons who we might be able to identify for them," Powell told reporters while flying to India, according to a State Department transcript. Pakistan should "give U.S. operations on the Afghan side of the border all the assistance that they can from the Pakistan side of the border," he said.

On Monday, Musharraf gathered hundreds of tribal chiefs at the Governor House in Peshawar and told them he believed 500 to 600 militants were hiding in the tribal belt. This is the first time that Musharraf has mentioned a specific number.

Also for the first time, he publicly acknowledged that "a dozen or two American experts" were helping Pakistani troops in the operation.

Musharraf promised that those militants who surrender voluntarily would "not be handed over to another country and will be tried in Pakistan." It is not yet clear if the U.S. government, which is likely to bring some, if not all, of these suspects to the United States also endorses Musharraf's pledge.

Musharraf told the tribal chiefs that he would "not allow the suspects to use the tribal area as a sanctuary for crossing over to Afghanistan and killing fellow Muslims."

The South Waziristan area, where Tuesday's clash took place, is part of a free tribal territory created under an agreement between tribal chiefs and the then British rulers of the subcontinent almost 100 years ago.

The agreement gives tribesmen total freedom in their own area and the tribes have so far fiercely defended their independence.

Pakistan also followed this policy of non-interference in tribal affairs when it won independence from Britain in 1947. Recent military actions, however, signal an end to this policy and may lead to more clashes with the tribesmen.

"The government is playing with fire. Such operations will turn the tribesmen against Pakistan," says Qazi Hussein Ahmad, a leader of the seven-party religious alliance called MMA. The alliance is the second-largest force in the Pakistani Parliament and strongly opposes the ongoing operation against the Taliban and al-Qaida.

"The Americans are here today, tomorrow they will be gone. The tribes are here forever, and they will never forget these operations," Ahmad warned.

All rights reserved. Copyright 2004 by United Press International. Sections of the information displayed on this page (dispatches, photographs, logos) are protected by intellectual property rights owned by United Press International. As a consequence, you may not copy, reproduce, modify, transmit, publish, display or in any way commercially exploit any of the content of this section without the prior written consent of by United Press International.

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