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Peace Deal Sought With Pakistan Militants

Pakistan Forces Let Tribal Council Enter Battlezone to Seek Peace Deal With al-Qaida Fighters

The Associated Press

WANA, Pakistan March 21 — Pakistani forces agreed Sunday to allow a 25-member tribal council free passage into a battlezone in an effort to negotiate a peace deal with local elders sheltering hundreds of al-Qaida fighters, but insisted they would never back off a demand that the militants be handed over.

The military believes a "high-value" target is hunkered down in the besieged area in South Waziristan, but says its uncertain if it is Osama bin Laden's Egyptian deputy, Ayman al-Zawahri, or another terrorist.

http://abcnews.go.com/wire/World/ap20040321_277.html

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US Official: Taliban Still Plotting Attacks From Pakistan

KABUL (AP)--Senior Taliban are still plotting attacks on Afghan and U.S. targets from safe havens in Pakistan, the U.S. ambassador in Kabul said Sunday, urging Islamabad to clamp down on Taliban fugitives, as well as al-Qaida leaders.

"We know several key Taliban figures are there and there is some sense that some of the remaining al-Qaida leaders are in the border area on the other side," Zalmay Khalilzad told The Associated Press.

"It doesn't serve Pakistan's interest for them to operate in Pakistan and to come across and attack Afghanistan or the coalition forces here," Khalilzad said in an interview.

The remarks keep up the pressure on Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf - a key ally in the U.S. war on terror - as he tries to make good on a pledge to rid semiautonomous tribal areas along the Afghan border of al-Qaida militants.

Khalilzad said the U.S. was "very encouraged" by an ongoing Pakistani offensive against hundreds of foreign fighters and allied Afghan tribesmen in villages in South Waziristan.

He said he couldn't discuss intelligence on whether the thousands of Pakistani troops using helicopters and mortars to pound the area had cornered al-Qaida's No. 2 man, Ayman al-Zawahri, but said he hoped it was true.

Khalilzad said key commanders of the Taliban regime ousted by U.S.-led forces in late 2001 for harboring al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden were operating out of Pakistan.

He said they included Mullah Dadullah and Mullah Brader, Taliban commanders believed to be orchestrating attacks in southern Afghan provinces including the former Taliban stronghold of Kandahar.

Khalilzad also cited a statement by Afghan President Hamid Karzai late last year that Taliban supreme leader Mullah Omar had been spotted in a mosque in the Pakistani city of Quetta - a remark that drew strident denials from Islamabad.

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

March 21, 2004 09:13 ET (14:13 GMT)