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| Blast hits Pakistani checkpoint | Blast hits Pakistani checkpoint |
| (20 minutes later) | |
| A suspected suicide bomber has killed at least nine people in an attack on a checkpoint in north-west Pakistan, officials say. | A suspected suicide bomber has killed at least nine people in an attack on a checkpoint in north-west Pakistan, officials say. |
| A number of people were also injured when the bomber attacked the checkpoint in Khar, the main town in the troubled Bajaur tribal region. | |
| Pakistani security forces have been battling militants in the Khar area. | Pakistani security forces have been battling militants in the Khar area. |
| Government officials said on Friday that at least 24 suspected militants had been killed in the fighting. | Government officials said on Friday that at least 24 suspected militants had been killed in the fighting. |
| "It looks like a suicide attack," regional police official Fazl-e-Rabi told Reuters news agency after the checkpoint attack. | |
| Adding that seven of the dead appeared to have been passersby, he said that the toll might rise as many of the wounded were in "critical condition". | |
| Initial reports suggested the attacker was in a vehicle. A local official later told AFP news agency the bomber had been wearing a suicide belt. | |
| The army mounted a major offensive against Taliban militants in Bajaur in August 2008, ending in a truce early last year. | |
| Close to the Afghan border, Bajaur has long been suspected of being the hiding-place of Osama Bin Laden, Ayman al-Zawahiri and other top al-Qaeda leaders. |