A roadside bomb killed five people including a government official on Saturday near the Afghan border, officials said. A journalist and a policeman were also among the five killed in the explosion which ripped through a vehicle in Bajaur tribal district, local official Mahmoor Khan said.

"It was a remote-controlled device which killed five people," he said. The victims were returning after attending a tribal council meeting in Salarzai neighbourhood when their vehicle was hit. Khan said the motive of the attack was not clear.

The council's meeting was held to resolve a February attack on a government polio vaccination team in the same region which killed a senior health ministry official.

Copyright Agence France-Presse, 2007