Militants based in Pakistani safe havens are stepping up
cross-border attacks in Afghanistanas security
cooperation between the United States and Pakistan remains under severe strain,
U.S. officials said.
On Tuesday, 16 people were
reported killed after armed militants laid siege for hours to the American
Embassy and NATO headquarters in Kabul, the Afghan capital.
The U.S. ambassador to
Afghanistan, Ryan Crocker, attributed the attack to the Haqqani network, a
group allied with al Qaeda and the Taliban based on the Pakistani side of the
Afghan-Pakistan border.
U.S. officials said they
believed the Haqqani network also carried out a truck bombing on Saturday at a
NATO outpost in Afghanistan's Wardak province that killed four civilians and
wounded 77 U.S. troops.
Defense Secretary Leon Panetta
warned Pakistan on Wednesday the United States would "do everything we
can" to defend U.S. forces from Pakistan-based militants staging attacks
in Afghanistan.
"Time and again we've
urged the Pakistanis to exercise their influence over these kinds of attacks
from the Haqqanis. And we have made very little progress in that area,"
Panetta told reporters.
"I think the message they
(the Pakistanis) need to know is: we're going to do everything we can to defend
our forces," he added.
Several U.S. government
officials said efforts by the United States and NATO to wipe out, or at least
curb, militants in Afghanistan were unlikely to succeed as long as groups like
the Haqqani network can operate with relative impunity from Pakistan's remote
tribal areas.
But one U.S. official noted
that just because small groups of Haqqani militants could mount attacks against
high-profile targets in Kabul, a long way from their safe haven, did not mean
the militants had free rein around the country.
"The Haqqanis are a
significant threat to security in Afghanistan, but they're not exactly in a
position to take over the country," the official said.
The network's suspected
hide-outs in Pakistan have become major targets for CIA drone strikes. But U.S.
counterterrorism officials said Pakistani officials had been pressuring the
United States for nearly a year to curb its clandestine operations inside
Pakistan.
The recent arrest, in a
Pakistan-U.S. operation, of an al Qaeda leader known as Younis al Mauretani,
marked a respite from tensions between the two countries. But one U.S. national
security official said al Mauretani's arrest was the only positive recent
development in an otherwise bleak counterterrorism relationship.
"The bilateral
relationship is still in deep trouble but the atmospherics are a bit better,"
said Bruce Riedel, a former CIA analyst who has advised the Obama
administration on policy in the region. "Name calling has largely ended
for now."
"FUNDAMENTAL
DIFFERENCE"
There has been "some
cooperation on interrogation of al Mauretani. But distrust has not gone away,
nor has the fundamental difference in approach to terror," Riedel said.
A current U.S. official was
more upbeat, saying, "Clearly the relationship is complicated, yet both
sides still find ways to get things done together against a common enemy -- al
Qaeda and their extremist allies."
Relations between the CIA and
Pakistan's principal spy agency, the Inter Services Intelligence directorate,
have been in a slump for months.
First, the CIA station chief
in Islamabad had to leave Pakistan after his name was leaked to local media
late last year. Ties deteriorated further when CIA contractor Raymond Davis was
detained by Pakistani authorities after he was charged with killing two men who
he said tried to rob him. Davis was later released.
Then in May, a U.S. commando
team killed al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden at a Pakistani hide-out without
notifying local authorities in advance.
In the wake of those
incidents, Pakistani authorities expelled at least 100 U.S. military personnel
who had been training Pakistani counterterrorism forces. Pakistani authorities
also began refusing new entry visas for U.S. personnel, including CIA officers.
Some American operatives
already in Pakistan have been asked to extend their tours of duty so operations
are not cut back drastically, officials said, but that risks straining their
morale and endurance.
(Additional reporting by David
Alexander; Editing by Vicki Allen and Peter Cooney)
Casino Classic
Source : Reuters
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