Pakistani planes bombed suspected Taleban positions in their Swat bastion on Friday as hundreds of thousands fled in terror and other trapped residents appealed for a pause in the fighting so they could escape. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees expressed his deep concern about the safety of people displaced by the fighting while the International Committee of the Red Cross said a humanitarian crisis was intensifying. Helicopter gunships and 12,000-15,000 troops were involved in Friday's operations, and up to 143 militants were killed over the previous 24 hours, after 55 were killed Thursday, said military spokesman Major-Gen, Athar Abbas. “It will be a long war,” he told Saudi Gazette. “ The operation will continue until it reaches its goal of eliminating the roots of Taleban in Swat and the nearby areas. We are trying to minimize collateral damage – the killing of civilians – and that is delaying the success of the operation.” The military operation in the scenic northwestern valley 130 km from Islamabad has become a test of Pakistan's resolve to fight a growing Taleban insurgency that has alarmed the United States. Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani had said in an address late on Thursday that, “In order to restore honor and dignity of our homeland and to protect the people, the armed forces have been called in to eliminate the militants and terrorists.” Abbas said the military regained “total control” of Chamat Lai, and Khoza Khaila, near Swat, Friday. Three soldiers were killed and 11 others were injured in the fighting, he said. The spokesman denied that Sufi Mohammad, who had signed a shaky peace deal with the government in northwest Pakistan, was the military's “prime target.” The eldest of Sufi Mohammed's 12 sons, Maulana Kifayatullah, was however killed in a military airstrike on Thursday “because he was leading the insurgents against the army,” Abbas told Saudi Gazette. He said another “high-value target” being hunted down is Mullah Qazi Fazlullah, a firebrand Taleban cleric known as “Mullah Radio,” who is the son-in-law of Sufi Mohammad. The spokesman said no foreign forces were involved in the military operations but foreign assistance in terms of “supplying helicopter gunships and providing aerial surveillance, including night-vision intelligence” reports, would be sought. “We are looking forward to the return of the writ of the state, reestablishment of the writ,” Abbas said. However, the militants in Swat “know the area, the terrain is ideal for guerrilla tactics or insurgency so, therefore, they have a great advantage,” Abbas said. The exodus from Swat adds to the more than 500,000 already displaced by fighting elsewhere in Pakistan's volatile border region with Afghanistan. UNHCR spokesman Ron Redmond said Friday in Geneva that up to 200,000 people have arrived in safe areas in the past few days and that another 300,000 are on the move or are about to flee. Military operations are taking place in three districts that stretch over some 1,000 sq. km. Much of the fighting has been in the Swat Valley's main city of Mingora, a militant hub that was home to around 360,000 people before the insurgency two years ago. Many of those have fled the city, but tens of thousand remain. Some have said the Taleban are not allowing them to leave, perhaps because they want to use them as “human shields” and make the army unwilling to use force. “We want to leave the city, but we cannot go out because of the fighting,” said one resident, Hidayat Ullah. “We will be killed, our children will be killed, our women will be killed and these Taleban will escape.” “Kill terrorists, but don't harm us,” he pleaded.
