Pakistani Taleban halt peace talks

PESHAWAR. April 28. KAZINFORM. The Pakistan Taleban has suspended talks with the government, a negotiator said yesterday, as helicopter gunships pounded suspected militant hideouts in the northwest of the country; Kazinform refers to Arab News.

?Our council of leaders met on Sunday night and decided to suspend peace negotiations with the government in North West Frontier Province,? said a spokesman for Sufi Mohammad, the cleric who negotiated a peace deal between the two sides in February. The announcement came after Pakistan?s military launched a fresh offensive against Taleban fighters in the northwest, under intense US pressure to stop the advance of the extremists in the region. Troops killed 20 militants in a ground and air operation in the northwest yesterday, the military said. British Prime Minister Gordon Brown warned in Kabul yesterday the Afghan-Pakistan border was a ?crucible of terrorism? as he touted a new strategy to tackle insurgency. Later, Brown arrived in Pakistan for talks on topics including cooperating against international terrorism. The Taleban promised to lay down their arms in exchange for Shariah courts in a deal billed as the end of a nearly two-year brutal insurgency that ripped apart the once-peaceful Swat area. But the agreement was followed by further encroachments in the region, and the government has been in talks with the militants to try to restore peace there. President Asif Zardari, who recently ratified the Shariah accord, told AFP yesterday that troops had now ousted the Taleban from Lower Dir; Kazinform cites Arab News. See www.arabnews.com for full version.