Pakistani forces battle militants

By Robert Birsel

ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - Pakistani forces have cleared militant strongholds from three areas in the South Waziristan region on the Afghan border and 40 militants and eight soldiers have been killed in the fighting, the military said on Thursday.

The army is sending in reinforcements and tanks after a week of fighting with militants loyal to a Taliban commander the government said was behind the assassination of opposition leader Benazir Bhutto last month.

The clashes, in which nearly 150 militants and more than 20 government soldiers have been killed, has raised fresh concern about the nuclear-armed country in the run-up to a February 18 election that could weaken President Pervez Musharraf's power.

Security forces had carried out operations in three parts of South Waziristan, the military said.

"These areas have been cleared of militant strongholds and hideouts," the military said in a statement.

"Forty miscreants have been killed in the last 24 hours and 30 miscreants have been apprehended while many injured," the military said. Eight soldiers were killed and 32 wounded.

The fighting is in strongholds of militant chief Baitullah Mehsud, who the United States has also said was behind Bhutto's assassination in a gun and bomb attack in Rawalpindi on December 27.

Mehsud has been blamed for a string of attacks in a suicide bomb campaign that intensified after commandos stormed a radical mosque complex in Islamabad last July. On Wednesday last week, his men attacked and captured another fort in Waziristan.