(Previous Incident Code: Ob10 )

As many as 17 people were killed when the home compound of ‘militant TTP commander’ Maulvi Gul Nazeer was attacked in Orakzai Agency by alleged US led air and drone strikes. It was, according to local media, the first known strike in the vicinity.

Gul Nazeer’s wife; daughter-in-law; two sons (Abdullah and Abdul Latif) and a nephew (Mohammad Shoaib) were all reported killed. Also slain were four or five alleged militants, including Kaka, an al Qaeda operative, and three other ‘Arabs’. Hakimuulah Mehsud, who went on to lead the TTP, may have been the target of the strike. He later told Reuters that six of his fighters had died in the attack. The CIA also briefed senior Pakistani officials on the strike, according to Bob Woodward in Obama’s Wars.

The TTP later reported that it had executed a man called Muhammad Qasim akaKashif in connection with the attack. They reported that “Qasim had accepted all charges against him in the Taliban court, including spying to facilitate the first-ever drone attack in Orakzai Agency on the house of a militant commander Maulvi Gul Nazeer.”

Dawn reported that “Local people said the double-storey building had been hit by at least two missiles. It could not be ascertained if any prominent militant leader was killed in the attack. Thirteen people were wounded.”

PakTribune added that “The injured were being transferred to Hangu hospital and other nearby medical facilities.”

On April 4 the TTP also launched a wave of suicide attacks across Pakistan, which according to a leaked US diplomatic cable were, “in retaliation for an alleged drone attack in Orakzai agency on April 1. Hakimullah [Mehsud, TTP leader] announced the Pakistani Taliban planned to carry out two attacks each week within Pakistan in what he called “revenge” against Pakistan for the missile strikes.”