Pakistan angry at NATO attacks

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — Pakistan on Monday strongly denounced airstrikes from Afghanistan-based NATO helicopters that killed more than 60 insurgents in Pakistan last weekend, warning that it would have to consider “response options” if it happened again.

While the U.S. routinely carries out unmanned drone strikes against al-Qaida, Afghan Taliban and Pakistani Taliban militants in Pakistan’s largely ungoverned tribal areas along the Afghan border, airstrikes from U.S. or NATO manned aircraft on targets in Pakistan have been rare.

U.S. military officials say their rules of engagement allow NATO aircraft to act in self defense against insurgents who have launched attacks against NATO or Afghan forces from Pakistani territory. The U.S. has said in the past that Pakistan has agreed to those rules, though Pakistani officials Monday denied that such an agreement exists.

The top commander in Afghanistan, Gen. David Petraeus, described the clash in Khost as an example of NATO forces being out in front of the enemy.

Speaking to reporters after a tour of the main U.S. detention center in Afghanistan near Bagram Air Field, Petraeus said the airstrike killed nearly 60 members of the Haqqani faction, which frequently attacks coalition troops.

“They were trying to infiltrate from Pakistan into Afghanistan in Khost, and attacked two Afghan border police posts, and [International Security Assistance Force] forces responded and caught those out in the open there,” Petraeus said, adding that NATO recently increased its force in Khost.

Later Saturday, two other NATO helicopters flying in the area were fired upon by insurgents on Pakistani soil and they too returned fire, killing at least four more militants, said U.S. Capt. Ryan Donald, a coalition spokesman. After the attacks, NATO officials informed Pakistani authorities about what had happened, Donald said.

NATO’s statement stressed that only airpower was used. “At no time during the engagement did ground forces cross into Pakistan territory,” it said.

In Washington, Pentagon spokesman Col. Dave Lapan said the U.S. followed the appropriate protocol in the situation.

“Our forces have the right of self-defense,” Lapan said. “They were being attacked, and they responded.”

On Monday, six more militants were killed in a helicopter attack in the Kurram region along the border, Reuters reported. A NATO spokesman said it was “near the border,” rather than in Pakistan.

NO HOT PURSUIT RULES

Pakistan reacted angrily to news of Saturday’s airstrikes. In a statement issued by the Pakistani Foreign Ministry, spokesman Abdul Basit called the strikes a violation of Pakistan’s sovereignty.

“These incidents are a clear violation and breach of the U.N. mandate under which [the International Security Assistance Force] operates,” Basit said in the statement. “There are no agreed ‘hot pursuit’ rules. ... In the absence of immediate corrective measures, Pakistan will be constrained to consider response options.”

While Pakistan has tacitly allowed the U.S. to launch unmanned drone missile strikes against Taliban and Haqqani militants in the country’s tribal areas, it has firmly said it would not allow foreign forces to carry out combat operations on its territory.

The new airstrikes could further strain Washington’s fragile alliance with the Pakistani military, which has repeatedly balked at launching an offensive against Haqqani network fighters who use North Waziristan as a base from which to launch attacks on U.S. and Afghan forces in Afghanistan. This summer’s catastrophic floods have forced Pakistan to divert thousands of troops to help flood victims cope with the disaster, making military action in North Waziristan unlikely anytime soon.

As a result, the U.S. had ratcheted up its drone strike campaign against militants in the tribal areas, focusing most of the attacks on suspected Haqqani strongholds and compounds in North Waziristan. So far this month, the U.S. has carried out 20 drone strikes in Pakistan’s tribal regions, killing dozens of suspected militants. The latest attack occurred Monday, when a drone-fired missile killed four people near the North Waziristan town of Mir Ali.

PUSH IN KANDAHAR

In southern Afghanistan, NATO pressed ahead Monday with a combat operation to drive Taliban fighters from areas around the southern city of Kandahar in the insurgent heartland. The push in Kandahar province, the birthplace of the Taliban insurgency, is a key part of the U.S. war strategy to rout insurgents from populated areas and rush in development aid and better governance.

“We have begun the operations into Zhari and Panjwai [districts], which turns out to have been a safe haven for the Taliban for some five years and only in recent months, when we increased the density of our forces, has there been a recognition of how significant that safe haven has been,” Petraeus said.

The commander noted that the number of Afghan security forces, civil order police and commandos outnumber U.S., Canadian and other forces operating in the two districts.

Coalition forces are moving into two or three areas around Kandahar at once to pressure the Taliban “so they don’t get the chance to run away,” said Shah Mohammad Ahmadi, chief of Arghandab district northwest of the city. “Before, when we have tried to get rid of the Taliban, when we cleaned one area we found more Taliban in a differentone.”

TALIBAN OVERTURES

Also on Monday, Petraeus said U.S.-backed Afghan President Hamid Karzai had received overtures from senior Taliban leaders responding to his initiative to open peace negotiations.

“There are very high-level Taliban leaders who have sought to reach out to the highest levels of the Afghan government, and they have done that,” Petraeus told reporters.

Afghan government officials, however, said the Taliban officials aren’t senior leaders.

Karzai has long said that he will talk to insurgents if they renounce violence, sever ties to terrorists and embrace the Afghan constitution. Publicly, the Taliban have said they won’t negotiate until foreign troops leave Afghanistan, yet there are many indications that backdoor discussions have occurred.

While opposed by some factions within Afghanistan, talking with the Taliban is gaining traction as thousands of U.S. and NATO reinforcements seek to reverse the insurgents’ momentum. Neighboring Pakistan and other nations are beginning to stake out their positions on possible reconciliation negotiations that could mean an endgame to the nearly 9-year old war.

Presidential spokesman Waheed Omar said Karzai was waiting until after he announces the members of his High Council for Peace before initiating any formal talks. That announcement could occur as early as this week.

“For the past couple of years we have had signals from different levels of Afghan Taliban wanting to reconnect with the government,” Omar said. “We haven’t had anything formal as yet.”

CORRUPTION INQUIRY

Meanwhile, Karzai’s eldest brother said Monday that he is not aware of a criminal investigation into his activities, an inquiry he claims is more about political differences with the U.S. than wrongdoing on his part.

“I’m hurt, because instead of being praised for what I’ve done, I’m being attacked all the time for political reasons,” Mahmood Karzai, a U.S. citizen who now lives in Dubai and has businesses in Afghanistan, told The Associated Press in a recent interview that touched on corruption claims made against him.

A federal criminal investigation under way in the Southern District of New York is now focusing on possible corruption involving Karzai, a U.S. law enforcement official said Monday. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because the ongoing investigation isin its early stages.

The Wall Street Journal first reported the investigation Monday, noting that prosecutors are trying to determine if they have enough evidence to bring charges of tax evasion, racketeering or extortion against Karzai.

Karzai said he is traveling to New York this week to amend his earnings on his U.S. tax returns to show profits from business deals not previously reported and says he will freely discuss his financial deals with American prosecutors.

“Why should they charge me? I’ve already volunteered to correct the problem. If they want to audit my taxes, they’re welcome to do that,” Karzai told the AP in the telephone interview last week.

“I’m not involved in anything with the U.S. contracts. I’m not involved with any contract with the government. I’m not working for the government. So my activities are completely private with private individuals,” Karzai said. “So my picture is very clear. You’ll never find anybody in the whole country who will say that I gave $10 to Mahmood Karzai for this or that favor. I do my projects here for developing. My whole life is open.”

Karzai said he’s been unfairly targeted by U.S. officials because of disagreements the Afghan president has with the U.S. government over policy issues.

“What I don’t like about international politics is that our family is treated like some kind of monarchy,” he said. “In other words, if there’s some dispute on policy matters with my brother, they will attack me or Ahmad Wali [another of the president’s brothers and a power broker in southern Afghanistan] to make him weak. This is, to me, so un-American.

“To crucify my rights for the sake of getting to my brother - this is an outrageous way of doing things.” Information for this article was contributed by Alex Rodriguez and Laura King of the Los Angeles Times; by Johnathan S. Landlay and Saeed Shah of McClatchy Newspapers; and by Deb Riechmann, Sebastian Abbot, Rasool Dawar, Heidi Vogt, Eric Talmadge, Mirwais Khan, Brett J. Blackledge, Tom Hays and Anne Flaherty of The Associated Press.