INTERVIEW - Kashmir blast won't distract Pakistan offensive

By Phil Stewart

TRIESTE, Italy (Reuters) - An unprecedented suicide bombing in Pakistani Kashmir on Friday will not distract security forces from their offensive against Taliban militants, Pakistan's foreign minister told Reuters.

"The militants are hurting and they are reacting. And this is a reaction to the successful operations we've had in Waziristan and we've had in the Malakand division," Shah Mehmood Qureshi said in an interview.

"But these odd attempts will not distract us. We are focused and we know what has to be done."

Islamist militants have carried out a series of bomb attacks across Pakistan in recent weeks in retaliation for the military's offensive, in which the government says about 1,600 militants have been killed in the former tourist valley of Swat.

But there had been no bombings in Pakistan's part of the disputed Kashmir region until two soldiers were killed on Friday in a suicide bombing.

The army is also preparing an all-out assault against Pakistani Taliban leader and al Qaeda ally Baitullah Mehsud in his stronghold of South Waziristan, on the Afghan border.

"We can't give you a timing. But we are moving at the right speed," Qureshi said during a trip to Trieste, Italy, where the Group of Eight industrialised countries were holding a conference on Afghanistan and Pakistan.

"We are moving in a focused manner. We are moving according to the resources available to us. We don't want to overstretch, nor do we want to give the insurgents time to escape."