Islamic militants in northwest Pakistan have paraded 48 people in front of the media and identified them as government troops who surrendered during fighting in the Swat Valley region.
Armed militants with masked faces escorted journalists to the town of Charabagh Friday to meet the captives. They also allowed television crews to videotape conversation with the detainees.
The captives were not in uniform, and their identities could not be verified.
On Thursday, local Pakistani officials denied that any soldiers had surrendered or had been captured by militants.
The officials also claimed 70 insurgents were killed in the latest round of fighting that began after militants attacked a military post.
Thousands of residents have been fleeing Swat Valley since violence erupted last week after the army deployed about 2,500 troops to regain control of the tourist resort in Pakistan's Northwest Frontier Province
Elsewhere in Pakistan, eight people were killed Thursday in a suicide bomb attack on an Air Force bus near Sargodha airbase south of the capital, Islamabad.
Earlier this week, a bomber killed seven people near Pakistan's army headquarters in Rawalpindi.
Some information for this report was provided by AFP and AP.
