By Saud Mehsud
DERA ISMAIL KHAN Pakistan (Reuters) - Missiles from a U.S. drone on Tuesday slammed into a suspected militant training camp in northwest Pakistan, killing six, intelligence officials said, in the third such strike in as many days.
Three missiles from the unmanned aircraft hit the camp in the Shawal area of South Waziristan just after midday, two intelligence officials told Reuters. Nine suspected militants were reported injured, they said.
The United States halted drone strikes for the first six months of 2014 while the government engaged in ultimately fruitless peace talks with the Taliban insurgency.
But the strikes restarted in June, just days before the military announced an anti-Taliban offensive, and their pace stepped up this month.
Five suspected militants were killed in a strike in Shawal on Monday, and another five killed in a strike in the same area on Sunday.
The Shawal valley is a thickly forested, mountainous area where many of the militants who fled the anti-Taliban offensive are believed to be hiding.
Pakistan's government routinely publicly protests the strikes as an infringement of its national sovereignty. But former President Pervez Musharraf admitted strikes during his term were approved.
(Writing by Katharine Houreld; Editing by Clarence Fernandez)