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McClatchyISLAMABAD, Pakistan —
Most of the Taliban fighters and all of their leaders apparently have escaped Pakistan's widely publicized six-week-old offensive in South Waziristan, forcing the army to begin pounding other parts of the country's lawless tribal area.Since Sunday, Pakistan has been launching aerial attacks on suspected militant hideouts in Orakzai, another part of the tribal area, and on Tuesday it extended operations to Khyber, the tribal territory closest to Peshawar, the provincial capital.
Though the army has extended its reach and now controls much of the former Taliban fiefdom in South Waziristan, the threat that was supposed to be extinguished seems likely to persist.
The Pakistani military also is likely to remain preoccupied with chasing the domestic threat rather than bowing to U.S. pressure to take on the Afghan Taliban groups, who've used North Waziristan as a base for attacking the U.S. and allied troops and the U.S.-backed government in Afghanistan.In Khyber, which houses the main supply route for NATO troops in Afghanistan, government forces killed 18 militants and seized their arms dumps, according to the Frontier Corp paramilitary force. In Orakzai, thought by many to be the most likely hiding place now of Pakistani Taliban chief Hakimullah Mehsud, government forces have killed at least 20 extremists since Sunday.
"The Waziristan operation is real, I'm sure of that, but where are the bad guys?" asked one Western security official visiting Pakistan, who couldn't be identified because he wasn't authorized to speak to the media.more:
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/251/story/79478.html
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