The incident in the lawless district of North Waziristan is the latest in a string of attacks on extremist targets on Pakistani soil that have raised tensions between Islamabad and Washington.

"Our reports suggest that around 20 suspected militants were killed when a missile hit a house in Mohammad Khel village in North Waziristan. Most were foreigners," a senior Pakistani security official said.

A local intelligence official said that 21 were killed including 16 foreigners, adding that most of those were Arabs. The house belonged to two Afghan refugees settled in the area, the official said.

Pakistani officials use the terms "Arab" and "foreigner" to describe militants linked to Osama bin Laden's Al-Qaeda network, the core of which fled Afghanistan after US-led forces ousted the Taliban regime in 2001.

Officials had no details about the identity of those killed.

There was no immediate confirmation from the Pakistani military or from the US-led coalition in Afghanistan.

The Pakistani military separately denied local reports that US helicopters and fighter jets from Afghanistan killed several people, including two woman and a child, in another part of North Waziristan earlier on Friday.

Local officials said US air power hit a village lying just inside Pakistan's territory after US troops came under fire in Afghanistan's Khost province. But the army said the incident happened in Afghanistan itself.

"Nothing of this sort happened in Pakistan's area," chief Pakistani military spokesman Major General Athar Abbas told AFP.

"They (US) have informed us that they were carrying out an operation on the Afghan side of the border. There are no casualties on our side."

The attack in Mohammad Khel comes three days after a missile fired by a suspected US drone hit a militant training camp in North Waziristan and killed eight foreign extremists, mainly Arabs, officials said.

The United States has stepped up attacks on militants in Pakistani territory since a new civilian government came to power in Islamabad in March, and the incidents have become an issue in the US presidential election.

Relations have also been strained by a raid by US special operations forces into Pakistan on September 3 which killed several Pakistanis.

Last week, Pakistani and US troops exchanged fire along the border after two US military helicopters came under fire, a US military spokesman said.

Meanwhile a suspected US drone crashed in the neighbouring tribal area of South Waziristan last week. Tribesmen said they fired at it but the Pakistani military said a malfunction was to blame.

Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari has vowed zero tolerance against violations of his country's sovereignty amid stepped up US missile strikes into apparent militant safe havens in the country's tribal areas.

str-rj-mmg-dk/cc

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