US-Afghanistan raid in Pakistan.

US-led and Afghan troops struck Taliban posts inside Pakistan, which denied giving permission, as new clashes left more than 30 rebels dead and there were claims Sunday of civilian casualties.

The US-led coalition said it received the go-ahead from Pakistan to strike across the border on Saturday, but this was rejected by the chief military spokesman in Islamabad. Afghan and coalition forces used mortars and artillery fire to destroy insurgent attacking positions on both sides of the border after a military post in Afghanistan came under attack, the coalition said in a statement.

"The Pakistani military gave permission for the Afghan National Security Forces to fire on the targets located within Pakistan," it said. Six insurgent positions were destroyed, three on each side of the border, and more than a dozen insurgents were killed.

A Pakistani military spokesman denied any permission was given. "There was no attack, no firing from our side of the border. And there was no permission asked by them or given by us," Major General Waheed Arshad said. US military spokeswoman, Captain Vanessa Bowman, insisted to AFP however that "this was fully coordinated with Pakistan and agreed on."

"There is a very close working relationship (with Pakistan) to eliminate this kind of threat," she said.

Remnants of the Taliban regime are believed to have fled into Pakistan after they were driven from government in Afghanistan in late 2001. From there they are said to train militants, with the help of Al-Qaeda, who launch attacks in Afghanistan. Pakistani officials have said repeatedly they would not allow any foreign troops to hunt militants on its soil, and insist they are doing what they can to hunt down the extremists. US President George W. Bush this month refused to rule out unilateral US strikes on Pakistani soil if specific intelligence pinpointed top Al-Qaeda leaders.

But he also expressed confidence in the efforts of Pakistan, a key ally in the US-led "war on terror" launched after the September 11, 2001 attacks. In another incident Saturday, soldiers killed a dozen rebels near one of the Taliban's largest strongholds, the coalition said separately.

A village elder, Atta Mohammad, told AFP by telephone that 18 people, including women and children, were killed when war planes struck in the remote southern province of Helmand as a wedding was under way. There was no way to independently confirm his claim. Afghan authorities said they had no information about the incident and the coalition denied there were civilian casualties. The clash was just inside the district of Musa Qala, which the coalition described as "the largest Taliban stronghold left in Afghanistan."

Also Saturday, Afghan troops clashed with rebel fighters in Zabul province, also on the Pakistan border, and killed nine of them, the defence ministry said. Eleven more were wounded. The same day, three suspected militants -- one of them a foreign national -- were arrested in another border province, Paktia, dressed in all-covering burqas worn by most Afghan women, the ministry said. Militants have previously used the burqa to escape detection by security forces.

The Taliban's insurgency against the US-backed government of President Hamid Karzai has grown steadily over the past years and now sees near daily attacks. The weak Afghan security forces are being assisted by nearly 50,000 international soldiers.


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