Pakistan has launched the first ground attacks of a new offensive against Baitullah Mehsud, the Taleban leader, in his mountain stronghold of South Waziristan — also considered to be the possible hiding place of Osama bin Laden.

A local intelligence official told The Times that there was heavy fighting yesterday between government forces and Mr Mehsud’s men around the villages of Madijan and Tanai following several days of artillery raids and airstrikes.

The militants had taken up defensive positions on hilltops and the government troops were attacking them, backed by F16 fighter jets, the official said. All telecommunications and roads in the area had been blocked. “The troops have started advancing towards Baitullah Mehsud’s territory,” he said. He said that the troops were trying to pin down Mr Mehsud and his men before the army launched an all-out offensive, called Operation Rah-eNijat (Path to Salvation).

The army has been moving troops and artillery towards South Waziristan over the past week and has imposed an economic blockade to try to turn Mr Mehsud’s tribesmen against him and force non-combatants to leave the area.

Fighter jets hit two compounds yesterday, three religious schools and a suspected training camp in the villages of Sarwakai and Barwand, both inside Mr Mehsud’s territory.

“We can hear explosions and gunfire but the area is sealed and no one can enter,” said Muhammed Salim, a shopkeeper, 30, in the town of Jandola, just outside Mr Mehsud’s territory. The fighting in South Waziristan comes eight weeks after the army launched an offensive against the Taleban in the northwestern region of Swat, triggering an exodus of about two million refugees. Ahmed Mukhtar, the Defence Minister, declared that the Swat operation was almost complete and said that refugees could start going home today.

He told Dawn News television that the army was now turning its attention to Mr Mehsud because he had claimed responsibility for a series of suicide bombings since the start of the Swat campaign. “We have informers who are after him and the moment his whereabouts are known, the forces are going to hit him,” he said.

The army said that its aim was to kill or capture Mr Mehsud, who is considered the main al-Qaeda facilitator in the country. Western officials hope that the attack will also put pressure on al-Qaeda, which has been sheltering in Pakistan’s Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) since the US-led invasion of Afghanistan in late 2001.

They say that al-Qaeda’s operations there have already been severely disrupted by US drone attacks, and that the group is seeking sanctuaries in Yemen and Somalia.

However, they also say that alQaeda will continue to operate from South Waziristan and North Waziristan if the army does not confront other Taleban leaders in the areas.

Pakistani and Western intelligence officials say that there are hundreds of foreign militants in the FATA — especially South and North Waziristan — including Arabs, Chechens, Turks, Uzbeks, Algerians, Moroccans and Chinese Uighurs.

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