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Gunmen attack NATO supply trucks in Pakistan

07 October 2010 02:12 (UTC +04:00)

Baku â€“ APA. Gunmen in Pakistan set fire to 20 trucks carrying supplies to NATO troops in Afghanistan on Wednesday, police said, the latest in a series of assaults on the logistical backbone of the war in Afghanistan, APA reports quoting â€œReutersâ€.
Pakistani authorities, angered by repeated incursions by NATO helicopters from Afghanistan, last week blocked a supply route for the troops in Afghanistan. The latest attack on fuel tankers took place on another route near the southwestern city of Quetta.
NATO incursions and the border closure have raised tensions between the U.S. and Pakistan, long-time but uneasy allies.
U.S. pressure on Islamabad to eliminate militants in its northwest tribal areas, who cross the border to attack Western troops in Afghanistan, is also a source of friction.
An alleged al Qaeda plot to attack European targets has put the Pakistani government’s performance against militants under scrutiny again, while the country reels from summer floods that left over 10 million homeless and heavily damaged the economy.
A British man killed by an air strike in Pakistan had ties with the would-be Times Square bomber, a Pakistani intelligence official, who declined to be named, told Reuters.
He said the Briton, Abdul Jabbar, had also been in the process of setting up a branch for the Taliban in Britain.
"He had some links to Faisal Shahzad but the nature of the ties are not clear," the official said, referring to the Pakistani-born U.S. citizen sentenced to life in prison in the United States on Tuesday for trying to set off a car bomb in New York’s busy Times Square.
Those links are likely to fuel concerns that al Qaeda and its allies, such as Pakistan’s Taliban, which trained Shahzad, are becoming an increasing threat to Western nations.
Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) in early September vowed to launch attacks in the U.S. and Europe "very soon". It had made previously similar threats but Shahzad’s plot was the closest it has come to success.
Before his sentencing, Shahzad denounced the presence of U.S. and NATO forces in Iraq and Afghanistan, described himself as the "first droplet of the flood that will follow" and mentioned al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.
The TTP claimed responsibility for most of the latest attacks on which hit nearly 70 NATO supply trucks. On Wednesday, 14 gunmen opened fire on trucks and torched them, killing a driver.
The U.S. has also ramped up pilotless drone aircraft strikes against militant targets within Pakistan’s borders, further deepening concern of a more aggressive U.S. war strategy.
Two missiles from a suspected U.S. drone on Wednesday struck a house in Miranshah, the main town of North Waziristan, killing six militants, local intelligence officials said. There was no immediate independent verification of the deaths.
The bulk of supplies for foreign forces in Afghanistan moves through Pakistan, which is itself battling a Taliban insurgency.
Analysts say supply routes to Afghanistan give Pakistan leverage over the U.S.’ war efforts in Afghanistan, although Pakistan often cites security concerns as reasons for closures.
Tensions could deepen if Washington demands more cooperation from Pakistan before a gradual July 2011 U.S. troop withdrawal from Afghanistan, which has raised concerns over stability there.
Islamabad is unlikely to budge. Cracking down on groups such as the Haqqani network would not make strategic sense.
Pakistan regards the Afghan Taliban faction, one of the most effective forces fighting Western troops, as an asset that can help it counter India’s increasing involvement in Afghanistan.
"If you are Pakistani and you know the United States is going to leave (Afghanistan) why would you want to turn everybody into your enemy? You can’t defeat them," said Kamran Bokhari, South Asia director for STRATFOR global intelligence firm.
European and American counter-terrorism officials have said that concerns about a group of about 100 German Islamists who had travelled between Germany and the tribal border areas of Pakistan contributed to the latest security alert in Europe.
A new White House assessment concludes that Pakistan has been unwilling to aggressively pursue al Qaeda and the Afghan Taliban in its tribal region of North Waziristan.
Pakistan has repeatedly said it is doing all it can to fight the militancy, pointing to the thousands of people it has lost in a wave of attacks over the past three years.