U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan could sound death-knell for Pakistan: Report

September 27th, 2009 KABUL - A senior advisor at the Afghan Foreign Ministry has seconded General Stanley McChrystal's stance that the Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) is still offering covert support to the Taliban in Afghanistan. Daoud Muradian said Taliban's recent resurgence in Afghanistan is being funded by Pakistan's intelligence services.

September 20th, 2009 ISLAMABAD - India and Afghanistan have covertly aided the outlawed Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), Geo TV reported Sunday quoting an official report. It said that 23 arrested militants of the group allegedly confessed they had links with Indian and Afghan intelligence agencies.

September 19th, 2009 ISLAMABAD - A report submitted to Pakistan high officials by a joint investigation team has allegedly claimed that the 23 arrested commanders of Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) have confessed involvement of secret departments of India, including RAW, and Afghanistan in supporting militants in Pakistan. According to reports, the militant commanders, including Sim Khan, Mahmood Khan and Maulvi Umer, who were arrested during operation Rah-e-Rast, have confessed that they were provided financial aid, weapons and special training by secret agencies from India and Afghanistan to fight against the Pakistan Army.

August 21st, 2009 WASHINGTON - While the US officials have maintained that there is 90 percent chance that the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) chief Baitullah Mehsud has been killed in a drone strike earlier this month, President Barack Obama, it seems, has no doubt about the Taliban chieftain's death. During a live radio broadcast from the White House, Obama said: "You've got the Pakistan Army for the first time fighting in a very aggressive way and that's how we took out Mehsud, the top Taliban leader in Pakistan who was also one of Osama Bin Laden's key allies." Obama said Mehsud's death was made possible due to an intensive US operation and sustained pressure on the Taliban and Al-Qaeda along the restive Pakistan-Afghanistan border.

August 13th, 2009 WASHINGTON - President Barack Obama's Special Representative for Pakistan and Afghanistan, Richard Holbrooke on Thursday said the Obama administration is keeping New Delhi posted about its policies on Afghanistan and Pakistan. Speaking on the situation prevailing in Afghanistan and Pakistan at a meeting organised by the Centre for American Progress, Holbrooke described India as a dominant power of South Asia Holbrooke said improving Indo-US relations has been a continual goal of the last three US administrations and opined that all of them had been successful in that.

August 10th, 2009 ISLAMABAD - Pakistan's Foreign Office spokesman Abdul Basit has claimed that no accord on drone attacks exists between Pakistan and US. The News quoted Basit, as saying that drone attacks had caused more damage than benefit to Pakistan, and Islamabad is perusing dialog with Washington to resolve this issue.

July 29th, 2009 LONDON - British Foreign Secretary David Miliband has commended efforts of the Obama administration to re-balance the relationship between the United States and Pakistan saying it is very important to stabilize Pakistan in order to maintain peace in Afghanistan. "We need a more stable Pakistan to get a more stable Afghanistan.

July 26th, 2009 LONDON - Saturday's suicide attack on government buildings in Afghanistan's southeastern city of Khost has raised fears in Pakistan about more such strikes and blood shed by the Taliban in the near future. With elections in Afghanistan less than a month away, the increased extremist activities has raised the pressure bar on Pakistan to help ensure a peaceful election.

July 18th, 2009 PARIS - France has named Thierry Mariani as its special envoy for Pakistan and Afghanistan, a media report said Saturday. The 50-year-old diplomat, a member of French President Nicolas Sarkozy's right-wing ruling party, will replace Pierre Lellouche, who was elevated to become minister for Europe last month, the Online news agency reported.

June 27th, 2009 LAHORE - The International Security Assistance Force deputy commander, Lieutenant General Jim Dutton, has said that the Pakistan military's operation against Baitullah Mehsud is extremely important in defeating the Taliban on both sides of the Pak-Afghanistan border. The Daily Times quoted him as saying, that the troop surge in Afghanistan could push the Taliban back to their original positions, including Pakistan.

June 10th, 2009 LAHORE - Pakistan's Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi has said the US move to send 21,000 extra troops to war-ravaged Afghanistan could have serious implications for his country. "Pakistan has talked through political and military ways at all levels to the stakeholders that transferring the problem from Afghanistan to Pakistan will not help resolve the issue," he told reporters in Islamabad on Tuesday.

June 2nd, 2009 WASHINGTON - US human rights activists may legally challenge US backed drone attacks in Pakistan and Afghanistan, which they say take lives of innocent civilians without giving any warning. "That's the spooky thing about the predator.

April 25th, 2009 LAHORE - US Special Representative on Afghanistan and Pakistan Richard Holbrooke has said there is no evidence that India is supporting violence in Pakistan. "If the Indians were supporting those miscreants in Pakistan that would be extraordinarily bad, really dangerous, but they are not doing so.

February 9th, 2009 LONDON - Britain has named Sherard Cowper-Coles as its new envoy for Pakistan and Afghanistan. Cowper-Coles, currently British ambassador to Afghanistan, will be appointed as special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, a new post, the foreign office said Monday.

February 8th, 2009 LONDON - Pakistan is the one country that really 'scares' Barack Obama, according to the US President's aides, a newspaper reported Monday. The Guardian said in a report from Islamabad that Pakistan - 'a nuclear-armed country hurtling towards chaos' - may turn out to be the biggest foreign policy challenge for the Obama administration.