Pakistani soldier beheaded to avenge US missile strike

KHAR, Pakistan - Pakistani authorities Friday found the body of a paramilitary soldier beheaded by Taliban insurgents in a tribal area where a suspected US missile strike left 12 people dead, an official said.
A note left on the corpse said the soldier had been killed in revenge for Wednesday's attack in Damadola village in Bajaur tribal district near the Afghan border.
The soldier was kidnapped overnight and his decapitated body dumped on the roadside some eight kilometres (five miles) from a paramilitary post near the main town of Khar, local official Mowaz Khan said.
"This is our revenge for the US missile attack," the note signed by militant group Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan, said.
Militants in the troubled semi-autonomous region have in the past kidnapped and killed soldiers, officials and pro-government figures accused of working with the Americans, as part of a campaign to maintain their stronghold.
The suspected US attack came as militants were negotiating a deal with the new Pakistani government, which came to power after the defeat of US ally President Pervez Musharraf's supporters in February elections.
Taliban spokesman Maulvi Omar on Thursday blamed the United States for carrying out the missile strike and vowed to avenge the attack, which killed at least 12.
A senior security official said two houses belonging to local Taliban militant leaders Maulvi Hasan and Maulvi Taj were the target of the attack, which destroyed the buildings.
Foreign ministry officials in Islamabad said Thursday the authorities were investigating what caused the Damadola explosion.
On Friday, around 100 students belonging to various Islamic seminaries held a noisy demonstration in the central city of Multan and burned the effigies of US President George Bush and Musharraf.
Protesters shouted "Americans are killers; stop spilling the blood of Pakistanis," before dispersing, an AFP correspondent witnessed.
The fundamentalist Jamaat-i-Islami party said the missile attack was "outright terrorism," by US forces across the border.
"The lives of Pakistanis are being sacrificed for the sake of US aid," party chief Qazi Hussain Ahmad told a press conference in the eastern city of Lahore.
Hundreds of people rallied in the northwestern city of Peshawar after Friday's prayers in protest at the suspected missile attack, witnesses said.
"The attack is an interference in the affairs of a sovereign country," local Islamist leader Sabir Hassain Awan told the rally.
Protestors carried placards and banners saying: "US is the biggest terrorist in the world. We condemn the attack in Bajaur."
Police said Islamic parties also held small demonstrations in several other cities of North West Frontier Province.
Pakistan is a key ally of Washington in the "war on terror" and has deployed nearly 100,000 troops in the lawless tribal territory that the US says is a safe haven for Al-Qaeda and Taliban militants.