Keep pressure on militants: US

NEW YORK - US President Barack Obama’s National Security Adviser Gen James Jones said Sunday the United States believes that Baitullah Mehsud, Pakistan’s top Taliban leader, is no longer in this world despite conflicting reports to the contrary.
Gen James Jones told “Fox News Sunday” that Baitullah Mehsud, whom he called a “real thug”, was killed and Pakistan’s Taliban leadership is now fighting within its top ranks to name its successor.
Claims and counter-claims about Baitullah Mehsud’s fate have swirled since a CIA missile strike last Wednesday on his father-in-law’s house in South Waziristan.
“Mehsud was a very bad individual, a real thug,” said Jones, who appeared on three Sunday talk shows. He said the US was 90 per cent confident that Mehsud was dead.
Jones congratulated the Pakistan Army for pressing the fight against the branch of the Taliban that lives inside Pakistan. The US insists some of the worst violence in Afghanistan is directed from across the border in Pakistan.
“If there is dissension in the ranks and if in fact he is, as we think, dead, this is a positive indication that in Pakistan things are turning for the better,” Jones said.
He did not give details about the strike, which is part of a US policy of cross-border attacks that is deeply unpopular with the Pakistani public. The Obama administration has continued the strikes even while trying to improve both the US relationship with Pakistan’s leaders and the image of the US and its fight against terrorism.
US officials regularly point out that terrorism is a large and growing danger inside Pakistan that the country’s own military is best placed to combat.
Jones called Mehsud “public enemy No. 1” in his own country.
Monitoring Desk adds: Jones said the US is nearly certain that Mehsud is dead, and there now is a leadership struggle within the “terrorist” group. He said the militant ranks are roiled by dissension.
He noted that Mehsud’s ouster and dissension within the Taliban represents an important moment in the struggle against extremism in Pakistan.