Gas field, rail track, power line attacked in southwest Pakistan

QUETTA, Pakistan, Sunday (AFP) - Suspected tribal rebels Saturday fired rockets at a major gas field, blasted a main power line and tried to blow up a rail track in the restive southwestern Pakistani province of Baluchistan, officials said.

Rockets fired by suspected insurgents damaged the water pumping station at the Pirkoh gas field, located some 370 kilometres (230 miles) southeast of Quetta, local administration chief Abdul Samad Lasi told AFP.

Pakistani forces shot dead 12 suspected tribal militants near the same gas field earlier this month after a roadside bomb blast killed three soldiers.

Tribesmen also bombed and damaged two main water supply lines which feed the gas field, Lasi said.

Meanwhile, Quetta police defused a three-kilo (6.6-pound) bomb planted at a main railway track just an hour before two passenger trains were due to pass, police official Khalid Garamkani told AFP.

"We have averted a major disaster and the early detection of a bomb planted on the track has saved the lives of passengers," Garamkani said.