Leaders of Al Qaeda and the Taleban have held a series of meetings in Pakistan to discuss how to disrupt Afghanistan's upcoming elections, the US military said on Monday. "Relatively high-ranking" members of both groups as well as rebel Afghan faction Hezb-e Islami Gulbuddin have held several meetings on how to derail the Oct. 9 vote, spokesman Maj. Scott Nelson said. Citing intelligence reports, Nelson said the meetings were marked by growing alarm at intensifying efforts on both sides of the Afghan-Pakistani border to root out their activities. "There have been several meetings between Taleban, Al Qaeda and HIG members in Pakistan where they've raised serious concerns" about efforts to track them down as well as how best to attack the election, Nelson said.
Nelson said the participants in the meetings were "relatively high-ranking," but wouldn't elaborate or specify where they took place. He said it was "certainly" possible that Osama bin Laden and other leaders of Al Qaeda were in the rugged border region. Maj. Gen. Eric Olson, the operational commander of the US-led force in Afghanistan, said this month that he had no fix on where bin Laden or his deputy, Ayman al-Zawahri, were located. But he said he believed the Al Qaeda leaders were still pulling some of the strings in the stubborn Afghan insurgency.
Nelson said the militants were divided over how best to thwart the election, which US-backed interim President Hamid Karzai is widely expected to win. "They talk, but I don't know how cohesive their strategies are," he said. He said militants were also debating how to counter muscular operations by both the Pakistani military and Afghan and US forces. Nelson praised the Pakistani military for "very aggressive operations in the areas where we think these senior leaders are hiding. They've had quite a bit of success." |