A suicide bomber killed four Pakistani soldiers and five civilians today in an attack on a military convoy in a valley in the northwest of the country, police said.
The attack came two days after a suicide bomber killed nearly 50 worshippers in a mosque in an attack on a politician in another part of North West Frontier Province.
Today's attack was in the Swat Valley, until recently a tourist destination, where the military launched an offensive in October to clear out militants who had infiltrated from strongholds on the Afghan border.
A senior police officer in the valley, Habib Zaman, said a suicide bomber in a car attacked a security convoy near the valley's main town, Mingora, killing four soldiers and five civilians.
Miliary spokesman Major-General Waheed Arshad confirmed the attack but said five civilians and one soldier were killed.
"It happened while the forces were returning to their base. It was a suicide attack," Arshad said.
Pakistan has seen a surge in violence this year with more than 400 people killed in suicide bomb attacks across the country in recent months, most of them in the North West Frontier Province.
On Friday, a suicide bomber detonated explosives amid a packed 1,000-strong congregation as a former interior minister, Aftab Ahmed Khan Sherpao, offered prayers. Sherpao was not hurt. He survived a similar attack in April.