Pak militants blow up 2 more schools

Militants blew up two boys' schools and a basic health unit in the lawless tribal region on Pakistan's border with Afghanistan, but there were no reports of casualties, officials said Saturday.
"A 14-room government high school and five-room primary school in Malangi village of Bajaur district were blown up with explosives late on Friday," local administration official Faramosh Khan told AFP.
He said that a nearby basic health unit, providing medical care to local tribesmen, was also destroyed.
"The primary school building was demolished completely while seven to eight rooms of the high school were destroyed by the explosive material planted in the building by militants," Khan said.
Local tribal police and intelligence officials also confirmed the incident and said no casualties were reported.
Pakistan's northwestern tribal belt has become a stronghold for hundreds of extremists who fled Afghanistan after a US-led invasion toppled the hardline Taliban regime in late 2001.
Bajaur is just west of Dir and Swat districts, where the military launched an offensive in April last year to crush a two-year Taliban insurgency.
Pakistani security forces launched a huge operation against Islamist militants in Bajaur in August 2008. In February 2009, they claimed the area had been cleared but unrest has rumbled on.
Meanwhile, investigators sifted through rubble yesterday after a suicide car bomber detonated his explosives-filled vehicle in a crowd watching a volleyball game in northwest Pakistan, killing at least 93.
Friday's bombing marked a bloody start to 2010 for Pakistan, which has seen a surge in attacks blamed on the Taliban in recent months as Islamist fighters avenge military operations aimed at crushing their northwest strongholds.
The huge blast was Pakistan's deadliest in more than two months, triggering the collapse of more than 20 houses, some with families inside, in a village bordering a Taliban stronghold, officials said.
The attack was condemned by Britain and the United States, with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton vowing the US would continue supporting Pakistani people "in their efforts to chart their own future free from fear and intimidation".
The bomber detonated his explosives-packed vehicle as fans gathered at a volleyball court to watch two local sides face off in the village of Shah Hasan Khan, in Bannu district, bordering Taliban stronghold South Waziristan.
"The villagers were watching the match between the two village teams when the bomber drove his double-cabin pick-up vehicle into them and blew it up," district police chief Mohammad Ayub Khan told AFP.
"Five more people died overnight in a government's main hospital in Lakki Marwat town raising the death toll to 93."
Six children and five paramilitary soldiers were among the dead, he added.