 A new investigative report in a leading American magazine claims that the Pakistan Army and its intelligence service are critical sponsors in the resurging Taliban activity in Afghanistan.
| Reeeeeaaaally? Golly. Gosh. Who'da ever thunkit? |
Sebastian Junger, author of the bestseller The Perfect Storm, which was also made into a movie starring George Clooney, writes in the April issue of the Vanity Fair monthly that while Pakistan has captured and turned over key Al Qaeda operatives, it hasnÂ’t turned over a single mid- or high-ranking Taliban official to the US since the 9/11 attacks.
| Except for Abu Zubaydah and Khalid Sheikh Mohammad. |
Junger says he talked with a former Taliban government official with current knowledge of the situation. According to that, some Pakistani military personnel are training Taliban recruits.
| Comes as a surprise, doesn't it? I know. Floored me, too. |
The Taliban official gave the American reporter the name and phone number of an ISI agent who supposedly brings recruits from a region in Afghanistan, inserts them into training camps in western Pakistan, and then sends them back to fight. Junger also writes that the an ex-Taliban member told him that the Pakistanis are receiving as much money from Osama bin Laden to not capture him as they are taking from the United States to catch him. “If true, this claim indicates both a level of duplicity that must start near the top of the Pakistani government, and a level of resources available to bin Laden that is extremely high,” he observes.
| I'd call the source of the information negligable if it wasn't for the fact that what he says jibes so seamlessly with what we've been seeing. |
|