Pakistan must stop supporting Taliban, US warns

Pakistan intelligence agency elements must stop support for Taliban, al-Qaeda: US

Admiral Mike Mullen, chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, and General David Petraeus, head of US Central Command, said that elements within the Inter-Services Intelligence agency must end their support for Islamic militants.

American commanders have rarely spoken in public about assistance which the ISI still gives to Taliban fighters for fear of damaging co-operation with Pakistan. But it is an open secret in Pakistan where many believe the agency plays a devious game by supporting both sides in the Afghanistan conflict.

The ISI helped set up the Taliban in 1990s as a way of projecting Pakistani power into its neighbour Afghanistan, and some of its operatives have been ideological supporters of jihad in the past although many of them have been purged from its ranks.

Admiral Mullen said that the ISI still had links to both guerrillas fighting Nato forces in Afghanistan and jihadists dedicated to attacking India.

In a television interview he said: "Fundamentally, the strategic approach with the ISI must change and their support ... for militants, actually on both borders, has to fundamentally shift." More

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