By DPA
Islamabad : Seven people, including three soldiers, were killed Monday in a string of attacks on Pakistani security forces deployed in the troubled North Waziristan tribal district close to the Afghan border, officials said.
The three troopers of Pakistan's Frontier Corps paramilitary forces died in a roadside blast when they were switching checkpoints set up in North Waziristan's administrative capital of Miranshah, the military's chief spokesman Major General Waheed Arshad said.
Four more soldiers sustained gunshot wounds when suspected Islamic militants ambushed their convoy in the Datakhel area as they were moving towards Miranshah from the town of Bannu located some 60 km eastwards.
Two civilian vehicles plying the road were also caught in the line of fire when the attackers positioned on higher grounds engaged the military personnel using heavy weapons.
According to Arshad, there were reports of four civilians being killed in the ambush.
In another incident, a remote-controlled bomb was detonated early morning when some army vehicles were moving between the far-flung village of Razmak and the town of Bannu.
"No major damage was done and just one soldier was slightly injured," he said.
After the attack, the security forces rounded up seven suspects fleeing in two vehicles and recovered the remote control used to set off the bomb. Authorities were interrogating the suspects who were similar in appearance to local people.
Meanwhile, four soldiers were also wounded in an overnight rocket attack on an army camp in Miranshah. The rockets also caused minor damage to the infrastructure.
Pro-Taliban insurgents have intensified attacks, including suicide bombings, on security forces deployed in the lawless tribal region bordering Afghanistan after the military operation against a radical mosque in Islamabad that killed 75 militants three weeks ago.
Up to 200 soldiers and policemen have been killed in bombings and ambushes that primarily targeted military convoys and checkpoints.