Friday, September 30, 2011

NATO presses Pakistan on ‘terrorist’ safe havens

NATO’s chief piled pressure on Pakistan on Friday to step up the fight against “terrorists” enjoying safe havens in the border region with Afghanistan.

Amid growing US pressure for Pakistan to take action against Al-Qaeda-linked extremists, NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen called for a “positive engagement” from Islamabad to ensure stability in Afghanistan.

“We encourage the Pakistani military and the Pakistani government to do its utmost to fight extremism and terrorism in the border region,” Rasmussen said at a defence forum hosted by the European Policy Centre think tank. “It is really a security problem for our troops in Afghanistan that terrorists have safe havens, and that’s a fact, in Pakistan,” he said.

“We have to deal with that and it’s in our mutual interest to deal with that.” “That’s a reason why we have conveyed that clear message to Pakistan authorities.” The Pakistani government and opposition leaders on Thursday closed ranks against increasing US pressure for action against the Al-Qaeda-linked Haqqani network, refusing to be pressured into doing more in the war on terror.

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