ISLAMABAD, PAKISTAN — American ground troops carried out a rare raid on Pakistani soil Wednesday, a cross-border attack from Afghanistan that left up to 20 people dead and provoked sharp condemnation from Pakistan's government.
The raid, described by Pakistani officials as having been carried out by helicopter-borne commandos in a hamlet just on the Pakistani side of the frontier, is likely to inflame tensions at a time when Islamic militants are already threatening to attack Pakistani officials and installations in retaliation for recent strikes against them by government forces.
The incursion into Pakistan's tribal areas by U.S. troops in Afghanistan was highly unusual, though not unprecedented. A similar raid by helicopter took place in 2006. American forces are widely believed to have conducted missile strikes targeting senior Al Qaeda figures in Pakistan, but other types of incursions are rare.
In Afghanistan, the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force and the separate U.S.-led military coalition, which conducts most operations in the border zone, refused to comment on the raid in South Waziristan, a known militant stronghold.
Pakistan's Foreign Ministry, in a sharply worded statement, did not specifically blame American troops for the early morning strike. However, it said it had summoned U.S. Ambassador Anne W. Patterson to lodge a formal protest.
The Foreign Ministry called the raid a "grave provocation" and a violation of Pakistani sovereignty.
"Such actions . . . certainly do not help our joint efforts to fight terrorism," the statement said. "On the contrary, they undermine the very basis of cooperation, and may fuel the fire of hatred and violence that we are trying to extinguish."
Pakistani officials offered varying accounts of the strike that triggered the Pakistani protests. But local, provincial and central government officials all insisted that the raid, which began about 3 a.m., involved foreign troops who crossed over from Afghanistan.
The governor of the North-West Frontier Province, which has partial authority in the tribal areas, said that as many as 20 people died, including women and children. Gov. Owais Ahmed Ghani termed the strike "outrageous."
An army spokesman, Maj. Murad Khan, said that about 15 people were killed, including seven civilians. Later, though, the chief army spokesman, Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas, told Dawn television that seven deaths had been confirmed.
