U.S. missiles slammed into a former school where Pakistani Taliban leaders were meeting Thursday, killing 12 people near the Afghan border in a strike that may have been aimed at the insurgents' top commander.

The militant chief, Hakimullah Mehsud, was not among the victims, intelligence officials and militants told The Associated Press.

The strike was the eighth such attack in two weeks in Pakistan's North Waziristan tribal region.

At least two missiles hit the Pasalkot area of North Waziristan around 7 a.m. Thursday, landing in a sprawling compound that has been used as a religious school in the past.

The dead militants included two foreigners, while at least eight militants were wounded, said Pakistani intelligence officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to speak to the media on the record.

Mehsud had been expected to attend the meeting, but authorities were still trying to determine whether he ever made it to the session, the officials said. They cited wireless communications intercepts tracking Mehsud's movements.

The militants said Mehsud was alive, safe and travelling. They spoke on condition of anonymity.

Nearly all the missile attacks in recent months have focused on North Waziristan, a segment of Pakistan's semiautonomous tribal belt where militant networks focused on battling the U.S. and NATO in Afghanistan are based.

Elsewhere in the tribal belt Thursday, a remote-controlled roadside bomb killed an anti-Taliban tribal elder and wounded six others as they travelled in a car following a meeting with other local elders, local government official Jawed Khan said.

The attack in the Halimzai area of Mohmand tribal region was just the latest in a series of such assaults on tribal elders who have sided with the government against the militants.