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Posted on 10/02/2003 7:56:47 PM PDT by blam
Pakistan launches huge raid on al-Qa'eda camp
By Robin Gedye, Foreign Affairs Writer
(Filed: 03/10/2003)
Heavy fighting erupted in Afghanistan and Pakistan yesterday as Islamabad launched its largest offensive yet against al-Qa'eda near the Afghan border, killing at least 12 suspected terrorists and capturing 10.
At least one Pakistani soldier was killed and two wounded in the day-long fighting which began with the dawn siege of an al-Qa'eda hideout three miles from the Afghan border in the Pakistani province of South Waziristan.
In another incident in Afghanistan, four suspected Taliban terrorists were killed when American helicopter gunships fired rockets at their vehicle in the Nish area, 50 miles north of Kandahar. The Taliban were returning from attacking Afghan forces in neighbouring Uruzgan province.
In Kabul, the Afghan capital, two Canadian soldiers were killed and three wounded in a landmine blast, the first incident involving Canadian peacekeepers. It was the worst such incident involving peacekeepers since four German soldiers died and 31 were wounded in a car bomb attack in June.
Amer Faisal, the commander of the operation on the Pakistan-Afghan border, said most of those killed and captured were foreigners with allegiances to al-Qa'eda.
He said the operation, in which more than 200 soldiers took part, was the largest by Pakistan against al-Qa'eda. It came as officials in Islamabad were preparing to welcome Richard Armitage, the US deputy secretary of state, for talks on the increasing threat from terrorism in the region.
Pakistani soldier guards suspected al-Qa'eda prisoners At the same time President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan has appealed for the world not to forget his country.
He warned the West not to let its involvement with Iraq cloud its commitment to Afghanistan.
"If they forget Afghanistan like they did in Soviet times, the consequences will be worse," he said.
South Waziristan faces the Afghan region of Shkin, referred to last week by Rodney Davis, the US military spokesman, as "the most evil place in Afghanistan".
An American soldier was killed and two wounded in a gun battle on Tuesday at a US base in the region, manned by several hundred infantry and special forces.
A resurgence of Taliban-backed terrorism has plunged Afghanistan into its worst cycle of violence since US-led forces liberated Kabul in late 2001, with more than 300 people killed on both sides since early August.
The Taliban have spent much of the period since the liberation regrouping in Pakistan's Northwest Frontier region but in recent weeks have begun moving south into Afghanistan, fanning out into the inhospitable mountain regions surrounding Kandahar.
According to US military intelligence, their plan is to cut off Kandahar, Afghanistan's second city, from Kabul and return to a guerrilla war in which they eventually hope to harass US forces to the point where they pull out.
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| Lighten Up, Francis! |
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Well the UN said so.
Go PAK, kick butt.
Maybe they got told, "You get'em or we will, your choice."
FRegards...
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