July 17, 2008	Thursday	Rajab 13, 1429

KABUL, July 16: President Hamid Karzai appointed on Wednesday a team of experts to investigate allegations that Pakistan had dumped nuclear waste in southern Afghanistan, his office said.

In April, an Afghan minister told the BBC that his government had evidence Pakistan had buried its nuclear waste in the southern Afghan provinces of Helmand and Kandahar during the 1996-2001 Taliban regime.

But the minister for parliamentary affairs, Farouk Wardak, later denied he had said this. Pakistan has also rejected the claim.

Karzai however has now set up, through presidential decree, a team of experts to investigate “rumours” of nuclear dumping, a statement from his office said.

“The delegation is assigned to thoroughly investigate the possible burying of nuclear waste using scientific, technical and residents’ observations in suspected areas,” it said.

The team comprised experts, security forces and intelligence agents, the decree said.

Meanwhile, US troops have pulled out of a remote outpost in northeastern Afghanistan, Nato-led security force said, three days after the Taliban tried to overrun the base and killed nine US soldiers.

Nato played down the significance of the withdrawal, but Taliban militants are sure to claim victory in driving foreign forces out of the wooded valley, close to the Pakistani border.

Taliban militants briefly breached the incomplete defences of the newly established base in the Wanat district of Kunar province on Sunday and hours of fierce fighting ensued that killed nine US soldiers and many more insurgents.—Agencies