ISLAMABAD — Pakistan claimed Sunday to be close to capturing the leader of the

Swat Valley Taliban after arresting five of his senior commanders last week.

Pakistan's army launched an offensive in April after militants seized control of much

of the valley in the country's volatile northwest. It claims to have cleared most of Swat

and killed more than 1,800 insurgents, although sporadic militant attacks continue.

The army announced Friday the capture five top Swat Taliban commanders, including

spokesman Muslim Khan — its first direct success against the militant leadership.

Interior Minister Rehman Malik said authorities were now closing in on Swat Taliban chief

Maulana Fazlullah.

"Fazlullah is surrounded, and he cannot escape us," Malik told reporters in Islamabad.

He said there were only one or two of the movement's leaders now left.

Malik claimed, "Fazlullah is now irrelevant" as midlevel leaders under him had been

either killed or arrested.

Yet militants remain active in the region. On Sunday, a suicide bomber attempted

to attack a checkpoint close to a fuel station in Swat. Security forces fired on his vehicle from a distance and it exploded, killing him, said Maj. Mohammad Mushtaq.

Elsewhere in the northwest, a bomb killed three paramilitary troops in the Khyber

tribal region, where security forces have mounted an offensive to secure a major

supply route for foreign forces in Afghanistan.

The bomb, detonated by remote control, targeted a security convoy in the Mandiknas

area, said Sadiq Khan, a local official. Two soldiers died at the scene and four were

wounded. One of the injured soldiers later died at a hospital.

Pakistan began its latest offensive in the Khyber tribal region on Sept. 1 and says it

has killed more than 150 militants. The fighting has caused thousands of residents to flee.

Militants have frequently attacked trucks traveling through the Khyber pass

carrying supplies to NATO and US troops in landlocked Afghanistan.

Meanwhile, in the southwest a land mine explosion killed two women and two children

from an influential ethnic Baluch family in the Dera Bugti area of Baluchistan province.

The mine was planted just outside the door of Ahmed Ali Bugti's home.

Police officer Mureed Bugti said the incident could be the result of a rift within the Bugti family.