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WORLD> Middle East
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Karzai threatens cross-border strikes
(Agencies)
Updated: 2008-06-16 08:06 Pakistan, reeling from a wave of suicide attacks since mid-2007, has opened peace talks with militants, including Mehsud. Afghan and NATO officials say cross-border attacks have risen since then. Pakistan supported the largely ethnic Pashtun Taliban militia when it seized control of Afghanistan in the mid-1990s and officially dropped its support after the Sept 11 attacks on the United States. Karzai, an ethnic Pashtun who is facing an election next year, said Mehsud and other Pakistani Taliban were tools of Pakistan's intelligence services. "(They) have been trained against the Pashtuns of Pakistan and against the people of Afghanistan and their jobs are to burn Pashtun schools in Pakistan, not to allow their girls to get educated and kill the Pashtun tribal chiefs," he said. "This is the duty of Afghanistan to save the Pashtuns in Pakistan from this tyranny and terror ... this is the duty of Afghanistan to defend itself and defend their brothers, sisters and sons on the other side." There is a long-running dispute between Pakistan and Afghanistan over Pashtun territory straddling both sides of the border. Afghanistan has never recognized the 2,640 km frontier, known as the Durand line after the British colonialist who drew it. Afghans say the border robbed Afghanistan of land and unfairly divides Pashtuns. |
