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Obama seeks more concerted effort against militants in Pakistan

Other News Materials 10 February 2009 07:54 (UTC +04:00)

US President Barack Obama says there is "no doubt" that al-Qaeda and Taliban militants have found refuge in Pakistani territory and that more focus is needed to tackle the problemif US and NATO forces are to prevail in Afghanistan, dpa reported.

"What we haven't seen is the kind of concerted effort to root out those safe havens that would ultimately make our mission successful," Obama said Monday night in a press conference.

His special envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan, Richard Holbrooke, arrived Monday in Islamabad to convey to the Pakistanis that "they are endangered as much as we are by the continuation of those operations," Obama said.

Washington has been frustrated by the slow pace of the Pakistani government's response to militants hiding in the ungovernable tribal areas, where raids are launched into Afghanistan against US, NATO and Afghan forces.

"My bottom line is that we cannot allow al-Qaeda to operate," Obama said. "We cannot have those safe havens in that region. And we're going to have to work both smartly and effectively, but with consistency, in order to make sure that those safe havens don't exist."

In Afghanistan, violence and instability have sharply worsened in the last two years. Obama has vowed to withdrawal US forces from Iraq and shift them to Afghanistan, and is reviewing options that include sending an additional 30,000 troops.

"This is going to be a big challenge," he said.

Obama said that Afghanistan, unlike Iraq, has been unable to develop a central government "functioning in a meaningful way" and sent another signal that Afghan President Hamid Karzai is falling into Washington's disfavour.

"You do not see that yet in Afghanistan," Obama said. "They've got elections coming up, but effectively the national government seems very detached from what's going on in the surrounding community."

Karzai intends to run for a second five-year term in elections in August despite worries of widespread corruption in his government and its inability crack down on rampant narco-trafficking.

Karzai has accused the United States of pressuring him to keep silent on US airstrikes that have allegedly killed dozens of civilians in the last year.

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