Actually, it's been their public stance from the start. They've never given us permission to conduct "hot pursuit."
We do conduct joint operations, though, and that's how we've caught some pretty big fish.
The radical islamics in that country are trying to make political hay over this latest incident, staging some protests around the country. This rhetoric coming out of Islamabad is undoubtedly meant for their ears.
Pakistan knows full well that it can't stop any hot pursuit, and they're not going to try. Politically, however, they can't publicly give free run of the country to US troops without causing an awful lot of domestic strife.
Pakistan queries US military claim to cross-border raid rights
| Friday, 03-Jan-2003 7:00AM | Story from AFP / Rana Jawad Copyright 2003 by Agence France-Presse (via ClariNet) |
ISLAMABAD, Jan 3 (AFP) - Pakistan's Interior Minister Faisal Saleh Hayat on Friday rejected the US military's statement that it was allowed to pursue attackers of its forces in Afghanistan into neighbouring Pakistan.
"There is no room or legal sanctions for any cross-border operation by US forces to pursue fugitives into Pakistani territory. We have no such policy," Hayat told AFP.
"There is no question of allowing any hot pursuit into our territory."
Information Minister Sheikh Rashid also reacted sharply to the hot pursuit claims.
"We would like to remind them (US military) that we are perfectly capable of securing our borders and the question of allowing any foreign troops into Pakistani territory does not even arise," Rashid told AFP.
A US military spokeswoman in Afghanistan on Thursday said US forces "may pursue attackers who attempt to escape into Pakistan to evade capture or retaliation... with the express consent of the Pakistani government."
The statement was made in a clarification of events surrounding a US warplane's bombing of an empty religious school on December 29 on the porous Pakistani-Afghan border.
A Harrier jet dropped a 500-pound bomb on the school after a Pakistani border scout fired on a US patrol and retreated to the school, from where firing continued, a US military spokeswoman said.
Islamabad said the bomb fell in Pakistani territory, while the US spokeswoman said the building was within the internationally recognised Afghan border.
She said it was in "a grey area," 300 meters beyond a Pakistani border post which had been established inside Afghan territory.
Pakistani authorities say no-one was injured by the bomb.
Reports of the incident have outraged Pakistan's Islamist-ruled North West Frontier Province, where anti-US feeling has run high during the 14-month old military campaign against the Taliban and al-Qaeda.
US forces have been working with Pakistani troops along the border to hunt al-Qaeda and Taliban extremists for more than a year.
Pakistan's Hayat described the cooperation as "excellent."
"Pakistani agencies and forces have been carrying out the task successfully and there is close liaison with coalition forces operating in Afghanistan," the minister said.
"In view of the close cooperation there is no question of allowing any hot pursuit into our territory."
A US soldier was wounded in the head during the border incident. The border scout who fired on the US patrol is in Pakistani custody, the US spokeswoman said.
A government official told AFP on condition of anonymity that there was an exchange of fire between the US and Pakistani forces, and that two border scouts were injured.
He said tension had been brewing for several days between the two sides at the border over the Pakistani post.
"The coalition forces were taunting Pakistani scouts that the post they had set up was inside Afghan territory," the official said.
"A scout had a nasty fight with some members of coalition forces and returned to his base and fired at the coalition patrol.
"There was exchange of fire in which two scouts were injured. This was not a big incident but purely a localised affair."
rj/bc/pch
US-attacks-Pakistan