9 troops, 2 police killed in Pakistan

Gunmen opened fire Thursday on government troops in a southwestern Pakistani city considered a Taliban hideout shortly after the visit of a top U.S. official, killing seven soldiers and two police.

The troops were attacked as they drove toward military quarters in the city of Quetta just before midnight, city police chief Rehmatullah Niazi said. Another five soldiers were wounded.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility. Niazi blamed "enemies and terrorists" but declined to elaborate.

U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Richard Boucher had already left the city to return to Islamabad before the shooting, the police chief said.

Earlier Thursday, Boucher met with Jam Mohammed Yousaf, the top elected official in Baluchistan province, who assured him that al-Qaida chief Osama bin Laden and Taliban chief Mullah Omar were not hiding in the region.

Pakistan is a key U.S. ally in the fight against terrorism, but some American and Afghan officials have identified Quetta, the capital of Baluchistan, as a hub of Taliban activity.

In March, Pakistani authorities captured former Taliban Defense Minister Mullah Obaidullah Akhund in Quetta.

President Gen. Pervez Musharraf has angrily rejected claims by Afghan President Hamid Karzai that Omar was living unmolested in Quetta, insisting that the Taliban leader was in Afghanistan's neighboring Kandahar province.

Yousaf told Boucher, who arrived in Pakistan on Tuesday, that he would not allow the region to be used for terrorist activity.

"There is no Taliban headquarters in Baluchistan ... Mullah Omar or Osama bin Laden are not in Baluchistan," a government statement quoted Yousaf as telling Boucher.