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PAKISTAN: Officials reject U.S. charges of links to Haqqani group

By Alex Rodriguez
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REPORTING FROM ISLAMABAD -- Pakistan on Thursday angrily rejected Washington’s allegations that it maintains links with the Haqqani network, an Afghan militant group believed to be behind a 20-hour assault on the U.S. Embassy in Kabul last week. The government also warned the U.S. that it would not tolerate any ground operation to hunt down militants on its soil.

Since the Sept. 13 attack on the embassy in the heart of the Afghan capital, U.S. military and civilian leaders have urged Pakistan’s primary intelligence agency, Inter-Services Intelligence, to sever its ties with the Haqqani group, an ally with the Taliban that uses northwest tribal Pakistan as a base from which to launch attacks on Western and Afghan forces in Kabul and eastern Afghanistan.

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The language coming from Washington has been particularly strong, with Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, accusing the ISI of using the Haqqani network to wage a proxy war against U.S., NATO and Afghan forces in Afghanistan.

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta has warned Islamabad that the U.S. will ‘take whatever steps are necessary to protect our forces.’

Asked at a news conference in Islamabad if there was any truth to Mullen’s charge, Pakistani Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Tehmina Janjua tersely answered, “I would say a categoric no.”

In an interview with the Reuters news service, Pakistani Interior Minister Rehman Malik also rejected allegations of any ties between Pakistan’s intelligence community and the Haqqani network, adding that ‘the Pakistan nation will not allow the boots on our ground, never. ... They must respect our sovereignty,” an apparent reference to Panetta’s remarks.

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-- Alex Rodriguez

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Alex Rodriguez

As the Chicago Tribune’s foreign editor/global connections editor, Alex Rodriguez helps oversee the paper’s Nation/World coverage while also helping to steward the Tribune’s efforts to cover Chicago’s connections to the rest of the world — economically, demographically and culturally. Before taking on his new post in August 2013, he worked as a foreign correspondent for 11 years. From 2002 to 2009, he was the Tribune’s Moscow Bureau chief, covering the territory of what used to be the Soviet Union and focusing on the impact Vladimir Putin’s leadership had on Russia and the rest of the world. From 2009 until August 2013, he served as the Pakistan Bureau Chief for the Los Angeles Times, covering one of America’s most important — and difficult — allies in the war on terror. Before working abroad, Alex spent several years as a reporter at the Chicago Tribune and the Chicago Sun-Times. He is a graduate of Western Illinois University in Macomb, Ill.

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