July 13, 2008	Sunday	Rajab 9, 1429

KABUL/ISLAMABAD, July 12: Nato-led peacekeepers in Afghanistan on Saturday blamed militants for a mortar attack two nights earlier that wounded Pakistani soldiers and Afghan police on either side of the border and led to a Pakistani protest.

“Insurgents simultaneously fired at targets in Afghanistan and Pakistan on the evening of July 10,” said a statement from the International Security and Assistance Force (Isaf) headquarters in Kabul.

Isaf said it had reports four Afghan police and eight Pakistanis were wounded in the two-way attack, and added it suspected the insurgents’ aim was “to spark a border incident”.

The clash occurred on the border near the Pakistani village of Angoor Adda in the South Waziristan tribal region. The village lies across the border from Bermal, a village near a US base at Shikin in Afghanistan’s Paktika province.

The peacekeepers claimed Isaf’s retaliatory air and artillery strikes did not touch Pakistani territory.

“Isaf forces tracked the fire to two points within Afghanistan and returned fire with artillery and one GBU-13 bomb dropped from an F-15 aircraft,” the statement said.

“All Isaf rounds were verified to have hit the origins of insurgent fire.”

Pakistani troops had also returned fire after coming under a mortar attack that wounded six soldiers and two civilians, a Pakistani military spokesman said.

He did not say if US-led coalition or Afghan forces fired mortars but added that a “strong protest” had been lodged with the headquarters of the coalition forces in Kabul on Friday.

The latest incident comes at a time of increased tension between Pakistan and Afghanistan.

Also, there are growing fears in Pakistan, a key ally in the US-led war on terrorism, that the United States is planning to mount operations inside its territory.

Afghan officials say there have been more attacks inside Afghanistan after the Pakistan military reached a de facto truce with militants based in Pakistan tribal areas.

The militants unleashed a wave of attacks across Pakistan over the past year.—Reuters