ISLAMABAD - A PAKISTANI official says that militants have fired a rocket into a town near the Afghan border and killed at least eight people.

Rashid Khan, a local government administrator, said suspected Taliban militants fired three rockets late on Thursday apparently aimed at a base used by Pakistani security forces in the town of Lanvi Kotal.

He said one of them hit the town's commercial area, killing at least eight people, injuring more than 30 and setting fire to a timber yard and a string of nearby shops.

The town lies in Pakistan's tribal region on a key road where militants have carried out a wave of attacks on trucks carrying supplies to US and Nato troops in Afghanistan. -- AP