Pakistan gains in Al Qaeda hunt
Foreign fighters are fleeing their village hideouts as 12,000 Pakistani soldiers step up their crackdown.
Many Al Qaeda and Taliban guerrillas in Waziristan are fleeing their village hideouts and heading up into the mountains along the Afghan border, according to tribal sources in the area.
Shunning their conspicuous Land Cruisers, the militants are camouflaging their movements by journeying with local woodcutters and shepherds, who head into the mountains to earn their livelihood.
Officials here say the fighters are being squeezed by the government's recent crackdown in the tribal region. Pakistan has deployed 12,000 military and paramilitary soldiers, and demanded help from tribal leaders, to round up Al Qaeda and Taliban elements.
"Our strategy against foreign terrorists is working very well," says Rehmatullah Wazir, a senior government official in South Waziristan. "They feel unsafe here. They are feeling the pressure, and we are coming down hard on their local supporters as well."
US forces in Afghanistan, meanwhile, have stepped up their hunt on the other side of the border, announcing over the weekend a new operation named Mountain Storm. US military officials have said they are coordinating their efforts with the Pakistanis to rid the region of Al Qaeda and the Taliban.
"It seems a part of the strategy of Pakistan and US-allied forces to herd them onto the mountains [for] a final battle there," says Sailab Mehsud, a writer and sociologist of South Waziristan. "But the battle will be tough, as the terrain of some of the mountains is like that of Tora Bora [in Afghanistan]. It has natural caves. Al Qaeda men seem to be well-equipped and prepared, and know the escape routes. Trapping them will be a difficult task for the US and Pakistan forces."
Tribal sources estimate that around 600 Al Qaeda guerrillas - mostly Arabs, Chechens, and Uzbeks - remain in and around South Waziristan. While not all of these wanted militants have left the villages, tribal sources believe that many have converged in the forest-covered, snow-swept mountain regions of Shikai, Bush, and Khamran.
"Al Qaeda are now avoiding traveling in Land Cruisers because they think they will either be spotted by American satellite or killed by chasing Pakistani forces," says local tribesman Farid Khan. He says Al Qaeda fighters are paying local woodcutters and shepherds, who are "known as the best guides," $85 to $170 each for the trip into the mountains.
"These poor people sympathized with them, and believe saving mujahideen from Americans is a service to Islam," says Mr. Khan.
Some of the foreign fighters are familiar to the local residents. The region was used as a "launching pad" into Afghanistan for thousands of anti-Soviet mujahideen, trained and funded by Pakistani and American intelligence agencies. After the Soviet defeat, many Islamic militants, particularly Uzbeks and Chechens, preferred to settle down in Pakistan's tribal belt.
"They look like Waziristanis now. They wear traditional dress, speak fluent Pashto, and follow our traditions," says tribesman Nasir Khan.
After the Sept. 11 attacks and the ouster of the Taliban by the US forces, the ideological bonding between locals and Al Qaeda fighters turned into a relationship.
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