14 people, including three women, were killed and 20 others injured in missile strikes by suspected unmanned US drones on a seminary linked to top Taliban Commander Jalaluddin Haqqani in Pakistan's restive North Waziristan tribal region on Monday.
Explosions were resounded in the area as six to seven missiles hit the seminary and nearby houses in the region often suspected to be the haven for top Taliban and Al Qaeda leaders.
Though the officials maintained that those killed were civilians, including women and children, other reports said that upto seven militants, including those of foreign origins, could have been killed.
The target of the attacks was a seminary in Tanda Darpakhel, 2 kms from Miranshah, the headquarters of North Waziristan. Reports said atleast four missiles hit the madrasa run by Haqqani.
State-run Associated Press of Pakistan news agency quoted official sources and local residents as saying that three female seminary students and three labourers were among the dead.
It was not immediately known if Haqqani was present in the area at the time of the strike. Haqqani, a close aide of Taliban supreme commander Mullah Omar, has not been seen since the fall of the Taliban regime in Kabul in 2001.
Haqqani, a veteran of armed struggle against Russian occupation and his son Siraj have been linked this year in an assassination attempt on Afghan president Hamid Karzai and number of attacks on US forces in Khost in southeastern Afghanistan.
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