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Pakistan

Pakistan police targeted as attacks kill 17

By Mubasher Bukhari

LAHORE, Pakistan, Oct 15 (Reuters) - Militants launched a string of attacks on police offices in Lahore in the Pakistani heartland and in the troubled northwest region on Thursday, killing 17 people after a week of violence in which more than 100 people died.

The attacks in Lahore, capital of Punjab province, and a car bomb in Kohat in the northwest come ahead of an expected military offensive against the Taliban in their South Waziristan stronghold.

Seven people were killed when gunmen attacked a regional headquarters of the Pakistani police's Federal Investigation Agency in Lahore.

One of the dead was a gunman and at least four were police officials, police said, adding that the building had been cleared of attackers.

A suicide car-bomber attacked the same FIA building in Lahore in March last year killing 21 people.

Gunmen also attacked two police training centres in Lahore but there was no word on casualties.

Provincial Law Minister Rana Sanaullah said there were up to 15 gunmen holed up in one of the training centres. Media said some hostages had been taken at the other centre, which militants attacked in April.

The attacks in Lahore. coming days after a daring raid on the army headquarters in Rawalpindi, underscored the risk posed by militants to Punjab, traditionally the seat of power.[ID:nL0320311]

The escalating violence has unnerved investors in Pakistani stocks, but on Thursday the main index <.KSE> was 0.34 pct up at 9837.75 at 0537 GMT.

"The market is sort of used to terror attacks," said Mohammed Sohail, chief executive at brokers Topline Securities.

"These high profile targets are a concern, but investors are optimistic that eventually the Waziristan operation will take place and the terrorists will be attacked."

DRONE KILLS FOUR

Shortly before the attacks in Lahore, a suicide car bomber set off his explosives outside a police station in Kohat killing 10 people, police and military officials said.

Pakistan's government has said a ground offensive against an estimated 10,000 hard core Taliban is imminent in South Waziristan.

The government says most attacks in the country are plotted in South Waziristan on the Afghan border and carried out by Taliban, often with the help of allies from militant groups based in Punjab province.

The Taliban claimed responsibility for the recent attacks, including the brazen assault on the army's headquarters in Rawalpindi, and vowed more violence in revenge for the killing of their leader, Baitullah Mehsud, in a U.S. missile strike in August.

The government in June ordered the army to launch an offensive in South Waziristan. Since then the military has been conducting air and artillery strikes to soften up the militants' defences. [ID:SP67432]

The government says the assault is imminent but it will be up to the army to decide when to send in ground troops.

Separately, a U.S. drone aircraft fired two missiles at a house in the North Waziristan region on the Afghan border, killing four militants, Pakistani intelligence officials said.

The drone fired at a house 3 km (2 miles) north of Miranshah, the main town in North Waziristan, and at least three Afghan Taliban members were among the four dead, the officials said.

"The owner of the house is a member of the Haqqani network," said one of the intelligence officials, referring to veteran Afghan militant commander Jalaluddin Haqqani, whose men attack foreign forces in much of eastern Afghanistan.

The United States, struggling with an intensifying insurgency in Afghanistan and frustrated with Pakistan's failure to eliminate Taliban sanctuaries on its side of the border, stepped up attacks by its drones in September last year.

Hundreds of people, most of them militants but including some civilians, have been killed.

(For more Reuters coverage of Afghanistan and Pakistan, see: http://www.reuters.com/news/globalcoverage/afghanistanpakistan) (Additional reporting by Augustine Anthony; Writing by Robert Birsel; Editing by Sanjeev Miglani)