13 July 2004	Tuesday	24 Jamadi-ul-Awwal 1425

KABUL, July 12: The US-led military coalition hunting militants in Afghanistan on Monday said Pakistani forces have stepped up their campaign against militant fighters in Pakistan's tribal border areas.

"We see Pakistan as aggressively pursuing terrorists in the tribal areas," US military spokesman Major Jon Siepmann told a regular news briefing in Kabul. He cited the example of Nek Mohammad, a Taliban-linked tribal leader who was killed in a missile strike during raids by Pakistani military forces in the bordering South Waziristan area on June 18.

He said the coalition force hunting militants on the Afghan side of the border was encouraged by the cooperation they were getting from their Pakistani counterparts. Taliban and Al Qaeda militants "are being pushed up towards a border that they continue to try and penetrate and we continue to try and kill them when they do."

Afghan authorities have repeatedly said that hundreds of Taliban remnants and Al Qaeda fugitives use Pakistan as a safe haven from which to carry out attacks on foreign and pro-government troops in Afghanistan.

More than 20,000 coalition troops under the leadership of the US are in Afghanistan to root out militants that oppose president Hamid Karzai's administration. -AFP