Qaeda now in Pakistan, says US general
'Task more complicated as combat missions in Pakistan not allowed'
BAGRAM AIR BASE, Afghanistan: The American general leading the campaign against al-Qaeda fighters in Afghanistan has said there may now be more of the extremists operating in Pakistan than in the original theatre of war.
Lieutenant-General Dan McNeill, the commander of coalition forces in Afghanistan, conceded that his task was now more complicated as the coalition does not have the right to conduct combat missions in Pakistan.
McNeill told AFP that while President Pervez Musharraf's government had been one of the staunchest supporters of the US-led war against terrorism, sympathy for al-Qaeda remained strong in tribal areas of Pakistan.
The general was reluctant to put a figure on the number of al-Qaeda fighters still at large, but suggested fewer than 1,000 were now in Afghanistan. "I think in Afghanistan they probably still exist, they could number in the hundreds. I think just outside Afghanistan's borders ... their numbers could be in the hundreds, maybe even a thousand," said McNeill.
Hundreds of al-Qaeda fighters are thought to have crossed the border into Pakistan from Paktia in the aftermath of Operation Anaconda in March, the largest coalition offensive of the 10-month campaign.
Pakistan has since been conducting its own operations against the extremist fighters. It is understood that US agents have also taken part in some of the missions. "I have seen that the Pakistanis concede there are indeed al-Qaeda in Pakistan," said the general. "I have seen no numbers attached but it would not surprise me to learn, and I do not know, that there are indeed more al-Qaeda in Pakistan than there are in Afghanistan. We do not disguise the fact that one of the ways that we attack terrorism is to attack its ability to find sanctuary, to deny them sanctuary. If they are indeed taking sanctuary in Pakistan where I do not operate then, sure, that makes our job a bit harder."
"The Pakistanis have a difficult situation in their country," said McNeill. "They have said they do this (support the coalition) at some risk to themselves because there are perhaps factions within their country that do not desire them to do such things. Some areas have had some degree of autonomy for more than 100 years, particularly in the north-west frontier. There are some indicators that some factions within those regions are more sympathetic to al-Qaeda than the coalition."
Pakistan security personnel have recently been conducting a major operation against remnants of the Taliban and al-Qaeda in the tribal-dominated region of Kala Dhaka in the NWFP. The search was launched after reports that an alleged Pakistani supporter of al-Qaeda had taken shelter there along with an undisclosed number of Taliban fugitives, Peshawar city police chief Khurshid Alam said. |
