Pakistan’s military on Friday said it killed 15 insurgents in air strikes in a restive tribal district near the Afghan border, a region where it has been battling extremist groups for more than a decade.

Pakistan's military on Friday said it killed 15 insurgents in air strikes in a restive tribal district near the Afghan border, a region where it has been battling extremist groups for more than a decade.

"Three terrorist hideouts were destroyed and 15 terrorists were killed in effective and precise aerial strikes early Friday morning in Khyber", where the Taliban and another banned militant group, Lashkar-e-Islam, have taken refuge, the military said in a statement.

Pakistan has been battling armed groups in its semi-autonomous tribal belt since 2004 after its army entered the region to search for Al-Qaeda gunmen that had fled across the border following the US-led invasion of Afghanistan.

In June, the army began an operation in the North Waziristan district after a bloody raid on Karachi Airport ended peace talks that began earlier in the year.