Security forces battling pockets of resistance in a mountainous Taliban stronghold killed at least seven militants Sunday and injured several more, officials said, as militants kidnapped and killed a prominent pro-government activist in another tribal area where the government claims to have near-total control, AP reported. Militants also blew up a girls" school in the Khyber tribal region, the latest in the Taliban"s campaign against modern education that has destroyed hundreds of schools across Pakistan, said local official Ghulam Farooq Khan. The school"s guard and three of his relatives were injured in the Sunday attack in the town of Bara, near where seven Pakistani paramilitary soldiers were killed in a Saturday roadside bombing. The Sunday fighting took place in the village of Kaniguram, which Pakistan attacked during its two-week-old offensive in South Waziristan, one of the semi-autonomous tribal regions where the Taliban has grown in power in recent years. -- SPA
