KOHAT, Feb 25: The local military fort has become a temporary shelter for people of Tora Ghundi and Tora Warai parts of Hangu, which have been turned into a battleground due to regular skirmishes between the troops and guerilla militants since 2006.

The militants had been attacking the region for several years now to regain control of the strategic region and expel the armed forces from Orakzai Agency and Kurram Agency, a local elder Inayatullah told Dawn on Thursday.

A couple of days ago five tribal children were killed and eleven others seriously injured when one of the six missiles fired at a security checkpost by militants hit a house in Tora Ghundi area.

According to the army publicity wing, militants fired seven rockets from the nearby mountains at a security checkpost in Tora Warai on Thursday. It said that the troops retaliated with artillery fire.

Officials said that the rockets were fired from an unknown side and they could not judge whether they had been launched from the mountains of Kurram Agency or Orakzai Agency. They said that the militants had increased attacks at the checkposts in the area. — Correspondent