Pakistan captures two senior Taleban leaders

Pakistan has captured two more leaders of the Afghan Taleban, Afghan officials revealed today, in the latest indication of a new level of cooperation between US and Pakistani intelligence agencies. Mullah Abdul Salam and Mullah Mir Mohammad were the “shadow governors” of the northern Afghan provinces of Kunduz and Baghlan respectively, running the Taleban’s increasingly powerful parallel administrations there. They were detained 10 days ago by Pakistani intelligence agents in Quetta, the capital of Pakistan’s south-western province of Baluchistan, according to Engineer Mohammad Omar, the official governor of Kunduz. “Two other Taleban who seem to be their bodyguards were also captured with them,” he told. The capture of Mullah Salam, 35, is especially significant as he had commanded the Taleban across all of northern and north-western Afghanistan and masterminded many attacks on German forces based in Kunduz. Mohammad Dawood, the head of Afghanistan’s National Directorate of Security in Kunduz, also said that Mullah Salam had been arrested by Pakistani intelligence agents. The two men’s detention appears to have coincided with that of Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar - the Taleban’s second-in-command - in a joint US-Pakistani raid in the south-western city of Karachi. The US, Afghan and Pakistani governments have yet to comment on the reported arrest of the two men, who both reported to Mullah Baradar - the Taleban’s military chief. But if confirmed, it would reinforce views that Pakistan has finally bowed to US pressure to take action against Afghan Taleban leaders who US officials say have been sheltering on its territory for years. The apparent breakthrough comes as British, US and Afghan forces are engaged in Operation Moshtarak - billed as their biggest assault on the Taleban since the US-led invasion of Afghanistan in 2001. One possible reason for Pakistan’s change of heart is that it fears the operation could trigger a flood of militants and refugees across the border to Baluchistan, destabilising a region already racked by a decades-long separatist insurgency. Yousuf Raza Gilani, Pakistan’s Prime Minister, raised the matter today in talks in Islamabad with Richard Holbrooke, the US special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan, according to Mr Gilani’s office. Mr Gilani expressed hope that, “Pakistan’s concerns on account of spill-over of refugees and militants from Helmand into south-western Baluchistan and the northwest will be kept in view”. He called for “enhanced coordination and cooperation” with Pakistan’s armed forces and pressed for a quicker release of the $7.5 billion in aid that the United States has pledged to Pakistan over the next five years. Pakistan backed the US-led War on Terror in late 2001 and has received more than $12 billion in American aid since then in exchange for cooperating in the fight against al-Qaeda and Taleban militants. But US officials have often accused elements in Pakistan’s military of shielding the Afghan Taleban leadership either because they share its radical Islamist ideology or want to use it as a proxy after foreign troops leave Afghanistan. US officials had frequently alleged over the last few months that Taleban leaders were sheltering in Quetta and Karachi, prompting fierce denials from Pakistani military and civilian officials. Some analysts say General Ashfaq Kayani, Pakistan’s army chief, has finally been persuaded that at least some Taleban leaders represent a threat to Pakistan’s national security. However, Pakistan’s foreign minister denied today that the arrest of Mullah Baradar was done under US pressure. “We have done it because it is in our interests to do so,” said Shah Mehmood Qureshi in the first comments about the arrest from a senior Pakistani official. “We do not want to see the Talebanisation of Pakistan,” he said. “This is service in a common cause.” Underscoring the continuing Taleban threat to Pakistan, a bomb blast at a mosque in the north-western Khyber region killed 29 people including some militants today. Meanwhile, at least three more people were killed in a suspected US missile strike on a house in the tribal region of North Waziristan - now considered the main militant stronghold in Pakistan.