[Dawn] NATO...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. A collection of multinational and multilingual and multicultural armed forces, all of differing capabilities, working toward a common goal by pulling in different directions...
chief Anders Fogh Rasmussen said Sunday he had written to Pakistain premier Yousuf Raza Gilani
... Pakistain's erstwhile current prime minister, whose occasional feats of mental gymnastics can be awe-inspiring ...
to express regret over the "tragic, unintended" deaths of 24 Pak soldiers in an
"I have written to the Prime Minister of Pakistain to make it clear that the deaths of Pak personnel are as unacceptable and deplorable as the deaths of Afghan and international personnel," he said in a statement. "This was a tragic unintended incident."
"I offer my deepest condolences and sympathy to the families of the Pak officers and soldiers who bit the dust or were maimed, and to the government and people of Pakistain, following the regrettable incident along the Afghan-Pak border," Rasmussen added.
Pakistain says two border posts were fired upon "unprovoked" in the early hours of Saturday in Pakistain's tribal
Mohmand... Named for the Mohmand clan of the Sarban Pahstuns, a truculent, quarrelsome lot. In Pakistain, the Mohmands infest their eponymous Agency, metastasizing as far as the plains of Beautiful Downtown Peshawar, Charsadda, and Mardan. Mohmands are also scattered throughout Pakistan in urban areas including Karachi, Lahore, and Quetta. In Afghanistan they are mainly found in Nangarhar and Kunar...
district.
An investigation of the incident is likely to ask whether Afghan and American troops on the Afghan side of the border were fired upon first -- whether by Orcs and similar vermin or Pak military.
According to a report in the New York Times
...which still proudly displays Walter Duranty's Pulitzer prize...
, A NATO front man, Brig. Gen. Carsten Jacobson, offered details suggesting that allied and Afghan troops operating near the border came under fire from unknown enemies and summoned coalition warplanes for help.
The NY Times report stated that: "In the early night hours of this morning, a force consisting of Afghan forces and coalition forces, in the eastern border area where the Durand Line is not always 100 per cent clear, got involved in a firefight," General Jacobson said, according to a transcript of his statements on NATO TV that the alliance provided American officials on Saturday.
Pakistain on Sunday conveyed its "rage" to the United States over cross-border NATO air strikes and ordered a full-scale review of its frosty alliance with Washington and the military bloc.
Pakistain represents a vital life-line to supply 130,000 foreign troops fighting in landlocked Afghanistan, and Rasmussen joined US efforts in a scramble to salvage the alliance.
"I fully support the ISAF investigation which is currently underway," he said of the International Security Assistance Force fighting the war and which includes non-NATO allies.
"We will determine what happened, and draw the right lessons," Rasmussen added.
"NATO remains strongly committed to work with Pakistain to improve cooperation to avoid such tragedies in the future."
Earlier Sunday, Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar telephoned US Secretary of State
Hillary Clinton... sometimes described as
The Liberatress of Libyaand at other times as Mrs. Bill, never as
Another Timothy Pickering...
and conveyed a "deep sense of rage" as the military organised a joint funeral for the 24 troops who died.