Pakistan fighters torch Afghan supply truck

Pakistani Taliban set fire to 20 trucks carrying supplies to Western forces in Afghanistan Sunday in the first major attack on a vital supply route through Pakistan in several months, police said.

A dozen more trucks and trailers were damaged when the militants, armed with automatic weapons and rockets, attacked a terminal on the outskirts of Peshawar city.

"Taliban militants fired four rockets on a truck terminal on the ring road on the city's outskirts and destroyed eight trucks completely," local police official Gohar Khan told AFP.

"The militants also torched 12 more trucks and trailers."

The trucks torched early on Sunday were parked at a depot on the outskirts of the city of Peshawar.

Khan also said police arrived during the attack, in which the two truck drivers were shot and injured, but the Taliban fled to the neighboring tribal area.

"Our policemen exchanged gunfire with the militants for half an hour but they managed to escape," Khan said.

"The government had ordered drivers not to use the bus terminal for NATO supply trucks after a series of attacks, but they illegally parked their trucks here."

"They came in the dark and threw petrol bombs as a result of which 20 containers and trucks caught fire. They then opened fire while running away," senior police officer Ejaz Abid told Reuters. Two guards were wounded, he said.

Abid said the trucks contained food while a witness said some military vehicles were also being transported to the border.

The government had ordered drivers not to use the bus terminal for NATO supply trucks after a series of attacks, but they illegally parked their trucks here

Gohar Khan, Police

The U.S. Defense Department says the U.S. military sends 75 percent of supplies for the Afghan war through or over Pakistan, including 40 percent of the fuel for its troops.

Police would take action against drivers who had broken a government order not to park NATO supply trucks at the bus terminal, he added.

Unsafe routes

The route from Peshawar up to the border through the Khyber Pass is the most important of two routes through Pakistan.

Taliban fighters stepped up attacks on the road through northwest Pakistan into land-locked Afghanistan last year, exposing the vulnerability of Western supply links just as the United States was planning a surge of troops to tackle the Taliban.

The U.S. has been trying to find new supply routes for its troops after the increase in Taliban attacks on convoys through Pakistan and said it expected soon to finalize an agreement with Tajikistan that would allow the transit of non-lethal supplies to Afghanistan.

Russia gave the go ahead this month for the first cargo of non-lethal supplies to cross its territory. The cargo went by rail across Russia and Kazakhstan and into Uzbekistan, which shares a border with Afghanistan.

NATO and US-led forces in Afghanistan are hugely dependent on Pakistan for their supplies and equipment, with an estimated 80 percent of their gear transported by land from the neighbouring country.

The main land route into Afghanistan, where international forces are battling a Taliban fighters, passes through Pakistan's lawless Khyber area.

Taliban in the rugged tribal area have staged spectacular attacks in recent months on NATO supply depots outside Peshawar, torching hundreds of vehicles and containers destined for foreign troops in Afghanistan.