Pakistanis Flee Escalated Taliban Fight

Pakistani jets screamed over a Taliban-controlled town Friday and bombed suspected militant positions as hundreds of thousands fled in terror and other trapped residents appealed for a pause in the fighting so they could escape.

The U.N. said half-a-million people have either already left or are trying to flee the bombings in the northwestern Swat Valley area that followed strong U.S. pressure on nuclear-armed Pakistan to fight back against militants advancing toward the capital as a now-defunct peace deal crumbled.

The sudden evacuations have the makings of a huge humanitarian crisis, reports CBS News' Farhan Bokhari in Islmabad. U.N. officials tell Bokhari that there is nowhere near the resources for the outlying towns to handle the sudden influx of refugees.

"There is just not enough preparation in other cities outside Swat to care for these people," said one U.N. official in Islamabad who spoke to CBS News on condition of anonymity. "If there is a long drawn conflict, there could be a major humanitarian crisis built around people from Swat," the official said.

Raheem Khan, a refugee who fled from Swat and arrived in Islamabad, gave a harrowing account of conditions in the region.

"There are food shortages which are becoming more and more acute every day" he told CBS News in an interview. "In areas where there is active exchange of fire between the Taliban and the army, it is not possible for many people to come out of their homes," he said.

The Pakistani Army says the Taliban is trying to stop civilians from getting out, using them as human shields, reports CBS News chief foreign affairs correspondent Lara Logan.

"At the end of the day, the question is, can you force a retreat of the Taliban and force a retreat where they are no longer popular and no longer controlling territory?" CBS News national security consultant Juan Zarate told Logan.

Taking back this area from the Taliban, is only part of the battle. In the past, the government hasn't been able to keep them out, Logan reports.

The crisis in Pakistan is unfolding just days after U.S. President Barack Obama hosted Pakistan's President Asif Ali Zardari and Afghanistan's President, Hamid Karzai simultaneously in Washington - a signal, observers say, of an intense commitment to what diplomatic experts now call "Af-Pak" issues.

Pakistan has launched at least a dozen operations in the border region in recent years, but most ended inconclusively and after massive destruction and significant civilian deaths. It remains a haven for al Qaeda and Taliban militants, foreign governments say.

To end one of those protracted offensives, the government signed a peace accord in Swat that provided for Islamic law in the region. But that deal began unraveling last month when Swat Taliban fighters moved into Buner, a neighboring district just 60 miles from Islamabad.

Pakistan's prime minister appealed for international assistance late Thursday for the growing refugee crisis and vowed to defeat the militants in the latest operation.

"I appeal to the people of Pakistan to support the government and army at this crucial time," Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani said in a television address. "We pledge to eliminate the elements who have destroyed the peace and calm of the nation and wanted to take Pakistan hostage at gunpoint."

The military hailed signs of the public's mood shifting against the Taliban after the militants used the peace deal to regroup and advance.

"The public have seen their real face," Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas said. "They realize their agenda goes much beyond Shariah (Islamic) courts. They have a design to expand."

Still, the pro-Western government will face a stiff task to keep a skeptical nation behind its security forces.

The mayor of Mardan, the main district to the south of the fighting, said an estimated 250,000 people had fled in recent days and that more were on the move. Of those, 4,500 were staying in camps, while the rest were with relatives or rented accommodation, he said.

Pakistani officials have said up to 500,000 are expected leave. The exodus from Swat adds to the more than 500,000 already displaced by fighting elsewhere in Pakistan's volatile border region with Afghanistan.

A spokesman for the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, Ron Redmond, said Friday in Geneva that up to 200,000 people have arrived in safe areas in the past few days and that another 300,000 are on the move or are about to flee.

Military operations are taking place in three districts that stretch over some 400 square miles. Much of the fighting has been in the Swat Valley's main city of Mingora, a militant hub that was home to around 360,000 people before the insurgency two years ago.

Army spokesman Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas said Friday that 140 militants had been killed in the last 24 hours, adding to around 150 already reported slain. He did give any figures for civilian deaths, but witness and local media say that noncombatants have been killed.

Tens of thousands of people remain trapped in Mingora. Some have said the Taliban are not allowing them to leave, perhaps because they want to use them as "human shields" and make the army unwilling to use force.

"We want to leave the city, but we cannot go out because of the fighting," said one resident, Hidayat Ullah. "We will be killed, our children will be killed, our women will be killed and these Taliban will escape."

"Kill terrorists, but don't harm us," he pleaded.