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MIRANSHAH, Pakistan (AFP) Taliban militants on Saturday shot down a pilotless US drone in a Pakistani tribal area bordering Afghanistan, officials said.
Residents and a local police official said two drones were flying low over a village in the South Waziristan tribal district when one of them was hit by militant fire.
"We heard the firing by Taliban and then a drone fell down," tribal police official Israr Khan told AFP.
Another security official said the drone crashed in a forest near a Pakistani border post.
"Apparently a drone has crashed in the nearby forest, we are searching for its wreckage," a security official told AFP.
Pakistan's chief military spokesman said the reports of a drone crash were being investigated.
"We have come to know that something has happened there, but we do not have any confirmation," major general Athar Abbas told AFP in Islamabad.
"We are further investigating and trying to find out."
More than two dozen suspected US drone attacks have been carried out in Pakistan since August 2008, killing more than 200 people, most of them militants.
At least eight militants were killed on March 1, in a US missile strike which destroyed a Taliban hide-out in South Waziristan, a known haven for Taliban and Al-Qaeda extremists.
Militant commander Baitullah Mehsud who heads the feared Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) is based in South Waziristan and is the country's most wanted militant, accused of plotting the 2007 assassination of former premier Benazir Bhutto.
Pakistan is a key ally in the US-led "war against terror" but the strikes have fuelled anti-American sentiment in the country, particularly in the tribal belt bordering Afghanistan.
US and Afghan officials have accused Pakistan of not doing enough to crack down on the militants, who cross the border to attack US and NATO troops.
Pakistan rejects the accusation, pointing out that more than 1,500 Pakistani troops have died at the hands of Islamist extremists since 2002.
The lawless tribal areas have been wracked by violence since Afghanistan's Taliban regime was toppled by a US-led invasion in late 2001, prompting hundreds of fighters to flood the region.
MIRANSHAH, Pakistan (AFP) Taliban militants on Saturday shot down a pilotless US drone in a Pakistani tribal area bordering Afghanistan, officials said.
Residents and a local police official said two drones were flying low over a village in the South Waziristan tribal district when one of them was hit by militant fire.
"We heard the firing by Taliban and then a drone fell down," tribal police official Israr Khan told AFP.
Another security official said the drone crashed in a forest near a Pakistani border post.
"Apparently a drone has crashed in the nearby forest, we are searching for its wreckage," a security official told AFP.
Pakistan's chief military spokesman said the reports of a drone crash were being investigated.
"We have come to know that something has happened there, but we do not have any confirmation," major general Athar Abbas told AFP in Islamabad.
"We are further investigating and trying to find out."
More than two dozen suspected US drone attacks have been carried out in Pakistan since August 2008, killing more than 200 people, most of them militants.
At least eight militants were killed on March 1, in a US missile strike which destroyed a Taliban hide-out in South Waziristan, a known haven for Taliban and Al-Qaeda extremists.
Militant commander Baitullah Mehsud who heads the feared Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) is based in South Waziristan and is the country's most wanted militant, accused of plotting the 2007 assassination of former premier Benazir Bhutto.
Pakistan is a key ally in the US-led "war against terror" but the strikes have fuelled anti-American sentiment in the country, particularly in the tribal belt bordering Afghanistan.
US and Afghan officials have accused Pakistan of not doing enough to crack down on the militants, who cross the border to attack US and NATO troops.
Pakistan rejects the accusation, pointing out that more than 1,500 Pakistani troops have died at the hands of Islamist extremists since 2002.
The lawless tribal areas have been wracked by violence since Afghanistan's Taliban regime was toppled by a US-led invasion in late 2001, prompting hundreds of fighters to flood the region.
