Posted by
kaleidoscope on Monday, September 08, 2008 11:30:38 PM
Witnesses said the apparent missile strike hit a
home of longtime militant leader Jalaluddin Haqqani, who U.S. military
officials say oversees one of the deadliest Taliban networks in
Afghanistan. Locals said some foreigners were among the dead.
Since
the end of August, there have been at least five reported missile
strikes against targets in North and South Waziristan as well as a
suspected U.S.-led raid on a Pakistani village near the Afghan border.
The
reported operations indicate a sharp increase in U.S. and NATO attacks
against suspected militants inside Pakistan, just as the country's new
government prepares to replace former President Pervez Musharraf.
Missile
strikes have traditionally provoked an outpouring of public resentment
that Musharraf's political opponents used to help drive him from power.
But Pakistan's former ambassador to Afghanistan, Rustam Shah
Mohmand, says many of those opponents are now seated in the new
government - giving it broader political support and fewer high-profile
critics.
"I think the government really is not concerned much
about the domestic fallout because there is no leader who would
challenge its position or who would rally people around him and launch
a country-wide protest. So the coalition forces, the Americans, are
taking full advantage of the situation where there is a sort of vacuum
as far as leadership is concerned," he said.
The government has
lodged protests with U.S officials over the strikes, but Mohmand says
officials have also reconciled themselves that the missile operations
will continue.
Meanwhile, Pakistan's incoming president, Asif
Ali Zardari, has reached out to Afghanistan's leader following months
of tension between the two countries over the Taliban insurgency.
Afghan
President Hamid Karzai is expected to be among the invited guests at
Mr. Zardari's presidential swearing in ceremony in Islamabad on
Tuesday.