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Cheney in surprise Pakistan talks
US Vice-President Dick Cheney has held talks with President Pervez Musharraf on a surprise visit to Pakistan.
Mr Cheney urged Pakistan to do more to combat the Taleban near the Afghan border, but also praised its role in the "war on terror", officials said.
Pakistan is a key US ally in the region but Washington has been alarmed by the Taleban's growing strength in its tribal areas bordering Afghanistan.
Mr Cheney spent only a few hours in Islamabad before flying on to Kabul.
His trip follows a report in the New York Times saying that US President George W Bush wants to send a tough message to Pakistan that Washington could cut its aid to the country unless President Musharraf goes after militants more aggressively.
It also coincides with one to Islamabad by UK Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett.
Taleban threat
The BBC's Barbara Plett in Islamabad says the US and Britain share concerns about an expected increase in Taleban fighting and the support the insurgents get from Pakistani tribes along the border with Afghanistan.
More
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/6396431.stm
Pakistan is a key US ally in the region but Washington has been alarmed by the Taleban's growing strength in its tribal areas bordering Afghanistan.
Mr Cheney spent only a few hours in Islamabad before flying on to Kabul.
His trip follows a report in the New York Times saying that US President George W Bush wants to send a tough message to Pakistan that Washington could cut its aid to the country unless President Musharraf goes after militants more aggressively.
It also coincides with one to Islamabad by UK Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett.
Taleban threat
The BBC's Barbara Plett in Islamabad says the US and Britain share concerns about an expected increase in Taleban fighting and the support the insurgents get from Pakistani tribes along the border with Afghanistan.
More
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/6396431.stm
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Cheney's unannounced stopover en route to Afghanistan came as British Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett also held talks with Musharraf and expressed concern about suspected militant safe havens near the Afghan frontier.
"Cheney expressed U.S. apprehensions of regrouping of al Qaeda in the tribal areas and called for concerted efforts in countering the threat," according to a faxed statement from the presidential office.
"He expressed serious U.S. concerns on the intelligence being picked up of an impending Taliban and al Qaeda 'spring offensive' against allied forces in Afghanistan," the statement said.
More
http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/asiapcf/02/26/cheney.pakistan.ap/index.html
Mr. Cheney’s trip was shrouded in secrecy, and he was on the ground for only a few hours, sharing a private lunch with the Pakistani leader at his palace. Notably, Mr. Cheney traveled with the deputy director of the Central Intelligence Agency, Steve Kappes, an indication that the conversation with the Pakistani president likely included discussion of American intelligence agency contentions that Al Qaeda camps have been reconstituted along the border of Afghanistan.
The decision to send Mr. Cheney secretly to Pakistan came after the White House concluded that General Musharraf is failing to live up to commitments he made to Mr. Bush during a visit here in September. General Musharraf insisted then, both in private and public, that a peace deal he struck with tribal leaders in one of the country’s most lawless border areas would not diminish the hunt for the leaders of Al Qaeda and the Taliban.
More
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/26/world/asia/26cnd-pakistan.html?hp