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Pakistan

Factbox - Security developments in Pakistan, 20 Nov 2008

Nov 20 (Reuters) - Following are security developments in Pakistan at 1330 GMT on Thursday.

* denotes new or updated items.

BAJAUR - Pakistani troops backed by artillery and warplanes killed 24 militants, including 11 foreigners, in clashes during the last 24 hours in the Bajaur tribal region, near the Afghan border, a paramilitary spokesman said. There was no independent verification of the casualties.

* SWAT - Sixteen militants were killed in an airstrike on a school building used by militants in Swat's Matta town, a military official said.

Seven women and a man were killed when Pakistani artillery fire hit two houses in Khawazakhela district in Swat, police said.

Taliban militants shot dead a man and flogged five others in public in their stronghold of Matta in the valley, for using and selling narcotics, police said. Separately, militants blew up five barbershops with explosives in the main town of Mingora.

MOHMAND - Two civilians were killed when a mortar bomb fired by Pakistani artillery on suspected militant positions fell on a house in the Mohmand tribal region on the Afghan border, residents and administration officials said.

(Reporting by Junaid Khan, Sahibzada Bahauddin, Mukaram Khan; Compiled by Augustine Anthony; Editing by Simon Cameron-Moore and Jerry Norton)