Washington - As Taliban militants edged closer this week to
the Pakistani capital of Islamabad, fear was palpable in Washington
that the nuclear-armed country was slipping toward greater
instability.
At the same time, US officials voiced frustration that the
Pakistani government was not acting strongly to confront the
militants and that by cutting deals with the Taliban, Islamabad was
only emboldening an extremist agenda.
The Obama administration closely links the rising strength of the
Taliban with the conflict in Afghanistan, which US officials believe
is jeopardized by the Taliban's ability to launch crossborder raids
against US, NATO and Afghan forces.
'These elements are a threat to not only Pakistan's internal
security but to its neighbors,' State Department acting spokesman
Robert Wood said Friday. 'And I'm focusing specifically on
Afghanistan.'
A major crisis in Pakistan appeared imminent this week, when the
Taliban took control of a Swat Valley district that lies about 100
kilometres north of Islamabad in the Northwest Frontier Province, a
rugged, mountainous area where the Pakistani government exercises
little authority.
The Taliban overran the Buner district after Pakistani Prime
Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani approved a deal with the Taliban that
allows the introduction of strict Islamic laws in nearly one-third of
the Northwest Frontier Province, in return for an end to the months-
long insurgency.
US President Barack Obama, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham
Clinton and the special envoy for the Afghan-Pakistan conflict,
Richard Holbrooke, held a meeting at the White House to discuss the
developments.
The Taliban began pulling out of Buner on Friday, after the
government threatened to scrap the deal and resume its military
campaign. Washington has pointed out that past deals have failed, and
US Secretary Hillary Rodham Clinton said this week that the militants
remain undeterred in their goal of toppling Pakistan's democratic
government.
'We cannot underscore the seriousness of the existential threat
posed to the state of Pakistan by the continuing advances now within
hours of Islamabad that are being made by a loosely confederated
group of terrorists,' Clinton told the House Foreign Relations
Committee.
Clinton called on Pakistani intellectuals in the United States 'to
speak out forcefully against a policy that is ceding more and more
territory to the insurgents, to the Taliban, to al-Qaeda, to the
allies that are in this terrorist syndicate.'
'I don't hear that kind of outrage or concern coming from enough
people that would reverberate back within the highest echelons of the
civilian and military leadership of Pakistan,' she said.
The Pakistani government maintains that it is not caving in or
conceding ground to the Taliban but has instituted a pause in
military operations to explore other alternatives to deal with the
militants.
The Army chief, General Ashfaq Parvez Kiani, said that the
military is not allowing the Taliban to dictate the terms of
governance in the region. He called it an 'operational pause meant to
give the reconciliatory forces a chance, (that) must not be taken for
a concession to the militants.'
The Army 'has resolved to fight to eliminate the militants, who
endanger the lives of peaceful citizens of the country and challenge
the writ of the state,' Kiani said, rejecting US concerns.
The Pakistani government has placed some of the blame on the
United States and its use of unmanned aircraft to target Taliban and
al-Qaeda militants near the Afghan border. The Pakistani government
say the flights violate its sovereignty and that the accidental
deaths of civilians fuel support for the insurgency.
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