US, Pakistan, Afghan Military Hold Talks

The commander of NATO-led forces in Afghanistan met with the army chiefs of Pakistan and Afghanistan in Islamabad Sunday to discuss border security and anti-terror coordination.

The meeting of the Afghanistan-Pakistan-ISAF Tripartite Commission came as Pakistani civilian and military leaders are preparing for talks Tuesday on ending the nearly six-month blockade of NATO supply routes into Afghanistan, following a NATO air strike last November that mistakenly killed 24 Pakistani soldiers.

The meeting, the first in nearly a year, is a key component of the international community's engagement in Afghanistan and has offered the opportunity for discussion on issues of tactical, operational and strategic importance.

The ISAF commander, U.S. General John Allen, said he was "very encouraged" by the talks with Pakistani General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, and Afghan General Sher Muhammad Karimi.

General Allen said "there was agreement these meetings are important to achieving continued progress toward our shared goals of a peaceful, stable, and prosperous Afghanistan" so the country "can no longer be a safe haven for terrorists again."

After the deadly NATO air strike, already tense U.S.-Pakistani ties plunged into a diplomatic deadlock. Pakistani officials demanded an unconditional apology. But Washington refused and Islamabad retaliated by cutting off NATO ground supply routes to international forces in Afghanistan. In return, the U.S. withdrew as much as $3 billion of promised military aid.

Islamabad also demanded an end to drone strikes, arguing they are counter-productive because they kill civilians, exacerbate anti-U.S. sentiment and violate sovereignty.

Washington says the strikes are crucial to defeating al-Qaida and the Taliban.

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Secret case against Pakistan officer

 From his prison cell, a senior Pakistani officer accused of plotting with a shadowy Islamist organization to take over the military released his political manifesto: His call was for the army to sever its anti-terror alliance with the United States, which he contends is forcing Pakistan to fight its own people.

"This may help us redeem some of our lost dignity and we badly need that," Brig. Ali Khan writes in the six-page document obtained by The Associated Press. The U.S., he says, might retaliate by cutting military and economic aid, but "do they not always do this at will? ... Our fears that the heavens will fall must be laid to rest."

The manifesto reveals the ideological underpinnings of the most senior Pakistani military officer detained for alleged ties to Islamist extremists.

The accusations against Khan go to the heart of a major Western fear about Pakistan: that its army could tilt toward Islamic extremism or that a cabal of hardline officers could seize the country's most powerful institution, possibly with the help of al-Qaida or associated groups like the Pakistani Taliban. Pakistani leaders dismiss such worries as ungrounded.

Details of the case, made public for the first time by The AP, point to efforts by some Islamist groups to recruit within Pakistan's military, though their success appears mixed. They also give a rare look into the discontent among some in the military over the rocky relationship with the United States, currently on hold after American airstrikes killed 24 Pakistani border troops in November.

Khan, who was arrested a year ago, faces charges of conspiring with four other officers and a British member of Hizb ut-Tahrir to recruit officers to the group including the commander of the army's 111 Brigade, which covers the capital and has been historically linked to army coups.

One witness at his ongoing court-martial said Khan discussed sending an F-16 jet crashing into the army headquarters, though that allegation has been withdrawn, according to Khan's lawyer Inam-ul-Rahiem. Pakistan's army declined to comment on the trial, which is supposed to be secret.

Hizb ut-Tahrir, which is banned in Pakistan and several other Muslim countries, professes non-violence and is not connected to terrorist groups like the Pakistani Taliban or al-Qaida. But the outfit makes no secret of its desire to penetrate the armies of Muslim countries, particularly Pakistan, and foment an "Islamic coup" to establish a global "caliphate."

In interviews, Khan's family and two of his army colleagues insisted he was innocent and has been targeted because of a falling out with senior officers and his political views — particularly his stance against the alliance with the U.S. Khan's lawyer has denied the charges and says no concrete evidence has been presented at the trial.

But one of the colleagues said Khan did meet with members of Hizb ut-Tahrir and tried to enlist other officers, though the colleague played down the importance of the contacts.

"He was easy prey," said the colleague, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was worried about prejudicing the case. "He walked into a trap. He was fed up with the government and (army chief Gen. Ashfaq Parvez) Kayani."

But he said Khan walked away from the group when it was clear his fellow officers were not interested in joining. The colleague said that he himself had also been approached by Hizb ut-Tahrir, via a cousin, but had turned them down.

"Our brother is honest and outspoken," said Khan's younger brother Bashir Ahmed. "He may have spoken against higher authorities and they don't like people to speak that way. That's why they are holding him."

At a meeting with other officers days after the May 2, 2011, raid by U.S. commandos that killed Osama bin Laden, Khan spoke out against the operation, which he and others on the forces considered a national humiliation.

Khan was arrested on May 5 and his manifesto presents himself as a "victim" of the bin Laden raid.

His lawyer, Rahiem, sought to submit the tract to a government commission investigating the bin Laden incident, but it was rejected. Some of the passages were included in a letter he sent to Gen. Kayani some time before his arrest, Rahiem said.

The manifesto doesn't call for an armed insurrection, support Islamic militancy or mention Hizb ut-Tahrir.

Rather, it is a refutation of Pakistan army's alliance with Washington, along the lines of what is often espoused by right-wing, Islamist Pakistanis. It buttresses its arguments with conspiracy theories, including that the United States was behind the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. In Afghanistan, he recommends a U.N. force of mostly Muslim nations to replace the current U.S.-led one.

Pakistan's army has has long portrayed itself as a bulwark against extremism, even as it has to sought to harness militants to fight for its interests in Afghanistan and India. While many officers are secular or irreligious, a growing number are thought to have embraced a more conservative form of Islam over the last 10 years, like the country they are drawn from.

Khan was known to be a conservative Muslim. At army staff college, he had the nickname "Mullah Rocketi" — roughly "rocket cleric" — and was lampooned in a graduation skit as a cleric, said one of his colleagues.

At the same time, anti-Americanism has been rising, fueled by anger at U.S drone strikes in the tribal regions, the killing of two Pakistanis by a CIA contractor in 2011 and the U.S. border post attack in November.

Some soldiers and officers have carried out occasional, but serious, terrorist attacks against the institution they once served. Militant sieges against army headquarters in Rawalpindi in 2009 and against a navy base in Karachi weeks after the bin Laden raid are both alleged to have had inside help.

The 600,000-member army releases little data on its enrollment or makeup, so its hard to say whether it is undergoing Islamization. A study last year on what limited data found no evidence the force was recruiting disproportionately from conservative areas of the country.

Lt. Gen. Khalid Rabbani, who commands 150,000 troops in the northwest leading the fight against militancy, scoffed at the notion his men could become attracted to extremism. "This is absolute rubbish, leaps and bounds away from reality," he said. "We are as disciplined a force as the British or American or any other first class army in the world."

Pakistan, a nuclear-armed country teeming with disgruntled Muslims, is a strategic priority for Hizb ut-Tahir, ex-members and analysts said.

A Britain-based spokesman for Hizb ut-Tahrir, which is strong among British Pakistanis, declined comment on Khan. But he said the group has recruited officers and would continue to do so.

"We call on the people in the armed forces to use their authority and fulfill their Islamic duty of stopping the political and military leaderships' transgressions," Taji Mustafa said in an email.

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US, Pakistan in intense negotiations aimed at reopening NATO supply line into Afghanistan

The United States has been holding intense negotiations with Pakistan to get the country to reopen its border to supplies meant for NATO troops in Afghanistan, a U.S. official said Monday, a day before senior Pakistani decision makers are set to discuss the issue.

The clock is ticking ahead of a NATO summit in Chicago on May 20-21 that is largely focused on the Afghan war. Pakistan will likely only receive an invitation if it ends its nearly six-month blockade of NATO supplies.

A team of U.S. negotiators has been in the country for several weeks working out the nuts and bolts of a potential agreement to reopen the supply line, said a U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue. The Americans met with their Pakistani counterparts all day Sunday and were scheduled to resume discussions Monday, the official said.

Pakistan closed its Afghan border crossings to the U.S.-led coalition at the end of November, in retaliation for American airstrikes that killed 24 Pakistani soldiers at two small outposts in the northwest. The U.S. expressed its condolences, but that wasn't enough for Pakistan.

Pakistan's government then threw the issue to parliament, which used the opportunity to try to renegotiate the country's relationship with the U.S., a popular move in a country where anti-American sentiment is rampant despite billions of dollars in annual U.S. aid.

Passing the gauntlet to parliament was likely meant to provide the government political cover, but the lawmakers' stark demands have made it more difficult for Pakistani officials to maneuver.

Parliament demanded an "unconditional apology" for the deaths of the Pakistani soldiers and an end to U.S. drone strikes in the country. Although it did not explicitly link these issues to reopening the supply line, they have complicated matters since the U.S. has refused both demands.

Analysts have speculated that the Obama administration is reluctant to apologize for the errant airstrikes because of potential criticism from Congress and Republican presidential contender Mitt Romney. Anger at Pakistan is high in the U.S. because of the country's alleged support for Islamist militants killing U.S. troops in Afghanistan.

U.S. officials have said in private that they have no intention of stopping covert CIA drone strikes in Pakistan, which they see as key to targeting militants in the country who pose a threat to the West. The strikes are immensely unpopular in Pakistan because many people believe they mostly kill civilians, allegations disputed by the U.S. and independent research.

The issue is complicated by the fact that Pakistan is widely believed to have supported some of the strikes in the past, although that cooperation has come under strain as the relationship between the Washington and Islamabad has deteriorated.

Pakistan has its own reasons for wanting to patch up the relationship with the U.S. In addition to an invitation to the upcoming NATO summit, Pakistan would like to free up over a billion dollars in U.S. military aid that has been frozen for the past year.

Also, other members of NATO, such as Britain, are unhappy with Pakistan's decision to block supplies for so long.

Pakistani Cabinet members and senior military officials are scheduled to meet Tuesday to discuss whether to reopen the NATO supply line. That session is to be followed by a full meeting of the Cabinet on Wednesday.

Unless the U.S. softens its position on Pakistan's demands, the government will have to balance the benefit of reopening the supply line with the potential backlash at home from anti-U.S. politicians and activists who will inevitably accuse the government of selling out to Washington's interests.

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Pakistan tests Hatf III ballistic missile

RAWALPINDI: Pakistan conducted a training launch of Short Range Ballistic Missile Hatf III (Ghaznavi), which can carry nuclear and conventional warheads to a range of 290 kilometers on Thursday, a statement issued by Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) said.

The launch was conducted at the conclusion of the annual field training exercise of Army Strategic Force Command (ASFC). The exercise was aimed at testing the operational readiness of a Strategic Missile Group.

The field exercise of the ASFC was witnessed by Chairman Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee General Khalid Shameem Wynne, Director General Strategic Plans Division Lieutenant General Khalid Ahmed Kidwai (R), Commander Army Strategic Force Command Lieutenant General Tariq Nadeem Gilani, Commander Karachi Corps Lieutenant General Muhammad Ijaz Chaudhry, Chairman Nescom Muhammad Irfan Burney and other senior military officials and scientists.

Addressing the troops in the exercise area, General Wynne commended the troops on displaying a high standard of proficiency in handling and operating the state-of-the-art weapon system.

He said, "The nation has developed a strong nuclear deterrence capability and expects that the officers and men entrusted with the task of deterring aggression would continue to train hard and maintain professional excellence."

General Wynne said that Pakistan's armed forces were fully capable of safeguarding Pakistan's security against aggression.

The successful test was also appreciated by President Asif Ali Zardari and Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani, who congratulated the participating ASFC troops, the scientists and the engineers on their success.

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Prime minister says Pakistan, U.S. operating on a trust deficit

With his fate at home hanging in the balance, Pakistani Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani repudiated U.S. claims that Pakistan was falling short on fighting the war on terrorism and said instead that his nation was operating on a trust deficit with Washington.

"There's a trust deficit between both the countries, between both the governments," Gilani said in an interview with CNN in London.

"That is the reason we are wanting to work for new terms of engagement and cooperation with the United States."

Pakistan has been a key U.S. ally, but relations between the two nations have been strained in recent months, especially after last year's killing of Osama bin Laden on Pakistani soil and a NATO airstrike in November that killed 24 Pakistani soldiers.

Amid a lack of harmony, the Obama administration has said it is not convinced Pakistan is pulling its weight. At the end of an Asia tour Tuesday, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Pakistan ought to do more in fighting extremism.

Gilani countered that his country was doing all it could in partnership with the United States.

"If there is any credible, actionable information, please share with us, because are already working with you," he said. "My ISI is working with the CIA. What else do you want?"

The ISI, or Inter-Services Intelligence, is Pakistan's powerful spy agency, which some U.S. officials have charged is protecting militant groups.

How can relations between the two nations, strained in recent months, improve?

"One point," Gilani said. "That is mutual respect and mutual interest."

A lack of trust is not the only stain marring a critical relationship.

Pakistan has said it wants an end to U.S. drone strikes on its territory, and Gilani made the point again Tuesday.

"We always take drones as counterproductive, and it's not lawful," Gilani said.

Back at home, Gilani faces myriad national woes: a faltering economy, widespread poverty and corruption. And now, his own future.

He was convicted last month of contempt for his refusal to revive old corruption charges against President Asif Ali Zardari.

Some analysts predicted the conviction would plunge Pakistan into crisis, perhaps even spark another military coup.

But on a five-day visit to the United Kingdom, Gilani remained confidant and defiant as ever about stepping down, saying that only parliament had the right to force him from office.

"If I'm disqualified, notified by the speaker, then yes I have to," he said about leaving his job.

Pakistan's Supreme Court issued a detailed verdict Tuesday that made it clear it held Gilani in contempt of court for defying the highest judiciary in the land.

Gilani defended himself just as strongly as he defended Pakistan and the course it has taken in battling terrorism.

"Whatever I have done is according to the constitution," he said. "It is not on any moral turpitude or financial corruption."

He said information about the most wanted terror suspects is shared with Washington. In the case of bin Laden, Gillani said Pakistan was not aware of the al Qaeda mastermind's residence in Abbottabad.

"That was intelligence failure of the whole world. It was not just an intelligence failure of Pakistan," he said.

Pakistanis, of all people, know the consequences of terrorists on their soil, he said.

However, Clinton said this week that the United States believed Ayman al-Zawahiri was hiding in Pakistan. Al-Zawahiri inherited the al Qaeda leadership after the death of bin Laden, who spent years on the lam in Pakistan, fleeing from safe house to safe house, according to one of his widows.

Clinton also touted the Rewards for Justice program, aimed at obtaining information that could help convict suspected terrorists. Rewards go as high as $25 million for information on al-Zawahiri and $10 million for information about Hafiz Mohammad Saeed, a Pakistani man wanted by Indian authorities in connection with the 2008 assault on Mumbai, India, that killed 166 people.

Asked why Saeed remains a free man, Gilani said Pakistan was still "waiting for some concrete sort of information and evidence" that could be used against him in court.

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Parents lobby for POW's inclusion in Taliban prisoner swap

The parents of Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, captured by the Taliban nearly three years ago, have appealed to the Obama administration to swap Taliban prisoners detained at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, in exchange for his freedom.

The appeal, made in a newspaper interview in their home state of Idaho, has induced the administration to make public its efforts to win Bergdahl's release in U.S.-Taliban negotiations that have been stalled since January.

He is the only U.S. soldier known to be held prisoner in the Afghanistan war. U.S. officials believe that Bergdahl, of Hailey, Idaho, is alive and is being held in the tribal area of Pakistan along the Afghanistan border by members of the Taliban-affiliated Haqqani network.

In an interview published Wednesday with their hometown weekly, the Idaho Mountain Express, Bob Bergdahl said the family had become frustrated with "how slowly the process has evolved" and decided to publicly advocate a prisoner swap.

"I'm pushing it hard," Bergdahl said. "We started out by trying to encourage the Taliban to take care of our son. ... Now, we're worried that the government isn't concerned enough to put him on the (negotiating) table."

The Washington Post had withheld information on those efforts at the request of Obama administration officials who said publicizing them could endanger his life.

"We had concerns about the security situation," said one U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity. "But this is now a different scenario. If they want to talk about it," the official said of Bob and Jani Bergdahl, "we can't ask for it to be withheld."

The Bergdahls said they were upset that although they have had good relations with the State Department and the Pentagon, they have never heard from President Obama. The two are Ron Paul supporters and have turned increasingly against the war in Afghanistan, although they support the president's plan not to withdraw most U.S. troops until 2014.

"He has never contacted us once," Jani Bergdahl said about Obama. "We haven't gotten a Hallmark card; we haven't gotten a note signed by an aide, nothing."

Accounts of the younger Bergdahl's capture in June 2009 have differed. In the first of five videos the Taliban released, a frightened-looking Bergdahl said he had fallen behind on a patrol in Afghanistan's eastern Paktika province. Since then, reports have suggested he left his base without authorization and was ambushed.

The Taliban have threatened to kill him unless a number of demands they have made over the years were met. These include payment of $1 million and the release of various Afghan prisoners and of Aafia Siddiqui, a Pakistani scientist convicted in a U.S. court in 2010 of the attempted murder of U.S. personnel in Afghanistan.

In a tentative deal reached by U.S. and Taliban negotiators last November, the administration offered to transfer five Taliban detainees at Guantánamo to house arrest in Qatar. In return, the Taliban were to make public statements renouncing international terrorism and agree to work with the Afghan government to find a political solution to the war. In what the administration insisted did not constitute a prisoner swap, Bergdahl was to be released.

The deal fell apart, and U.S.-Taliban meetings have been suspended since January.

While the Bergdahls said they have reason to believe their son is alive, they are worried he could be harmed by U.S. drone attacks in Pakistan.

"Bowe's been under the drone program the entire time," Bob Bergdahl said in the newspaper interview. "It scares ... us."

The last Taliban video featuring Sgt. Bergdahl was posted on the Internet in May 2011. Bergdahl, 26, was a private when captured but has since been promoted.

His father said he hoped to spark a grass-roots movement to "raise awareness that there is an American POW."

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Islam-offending US teacher forced to apologise

Saudi students in US protest anti-Islam remarks by female American teacher

A female university teacher in the United States had to apologise to her Saudi students for offending Islam after they protested her behaviour to the management, Saudi newspapers reported on Tuesday.

The students went straight to the teacher's direct manager and complained that she had placed anti-Islamic pictures with abusive remarks in their books. They threatened that in case no action was taken, they would go to the chairman of the University of Central Arkansas in the southern state of America.

"We went into the office of the manager of the institute where we study and submitted a protest…we told her that if she does not take action against the teacher, we will go to the head of the university," Saudi student Ahmed bin Daheem Al Hajour said, quoted by the Saudi Ajel newspaper.

"The manager did take action as promised and forced that teacher to apologise to us by sending messages to each of us on our Facebook pages…. she even removed her son's picture from her Facebook page and replaced it with the flag of Saudi Arabia."

Ajel published what it said was a copy of the US teacher's message to the students apologising to them and saying it was an intentional mistake.

"I just want to apologise to you if you saw something here the other day that was offensive to Islam…I liked the picture because I liked the caption-- I didn't even look at the picture I was liking…it was a stupid mistake and I didn't even realise until a student complained to Amy (manager) and she talked to me," the teacher said in her message.

"I want you to know I care deeply about my Saudi students…last term for example, I rearranged my class schedule so that the men could attend mosque and not have to miss class…..I have always tried to be sensible and respectful, so I feel terrible that I made such a stupid and thoughtless mistake… I would never intentionally do something to be offensive."

Saudi readers reacting to the incident poured praise on the students while an angry reader who was not identified said :"As if the twin-towers disaster was not enough for them (Americans)," in a reference to the 2001 September terror attacks on the World Trade Centre in New York.

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