BUB: Pakistani Snits, Dead Taliban Twits, Truck Drivers Quit

The Pakistani border closing has resulted in truck drivers walking off: "Nobody will drive and take fuel to NATO"...

Jan Mohammed led me across the muddy yard packed with burned and still smoldering fuel tankers.
"If we don't have any security, how can we go up there?" he asked. "Nobody will drive and take fuel to NATO. It's impossible."
He was referring to the Khyber Pass in Pakistan's northwest, a key route for supplies heading to the war in Afghanistan.

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And yet somehow, NATO says the campaign in unaffected by their supply lines being cut in half.

Nato insists its war effort in Afghanistan has not been impeded by a row with Pakistan that has left its supply routes vulnerable.

Attacks on convoys have soared since Pakistan shut a key border-crossing because of a Nato air-strike which killed at least two soldiers.

The US has now apologised for the attack, promising to work with Pakistan to prevent a repeat of the incident.

Nato says it expects the border dispute to be resolved soon.

But relations with Islamabad have been placed in further doubt by a White House report that has questioned Pakistan's willingness to curb militants.

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The US has now apologized for the helicopter strike.

The United States apologised on Wednesday for a recent NATO helicopter cross-border strike that killed Pakistani soldiers.

The deadly attack triggered a row between the two allies and Pakistan shut the main land route for NATO supplies into Afghanistan soon afterwards.

Authorities in the northwest said two soldiers died, while a Pakistan military spokesman put the toll at three.

US ambassador to Pakistan Anne Patterson said she was extending an apology on behalf of the American people over the "terrible accident". The statement said two Pakistani Frontier Scouts were killed and four injured.

The incident took place last Thursday in the Kurram district of Pakistan's northwestern tribal belt, which Washington has branded an Al-Qaeda headquarters and a hub for militants fighting in Afghanistan.

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And have gone right back to blasting Taliban leaders into dust.

An airstrike and a raid by ground troops killed eight insurgents, including a senior Taliban leader who spearheaded attacks against Afghan security forces, NATO said Thursday as the war in Afghanistan entered its 10th year.

Maulawi Jawadullah — accused of organizing deadly ambushes, roadside bomb attacks, and abductions of Afghan police and soldiers in northern Afghanistan — was killed in the airstrike Wednesday in Takhar province, an alliance statement said.

Jawadullah was linked to the recent deaths of 10 Afghan National Police officers during an attack on a police station in neighboring Kunduz province, it said.

Seven other Taliban also died in the assault, including three who opened fire from a forest when coalition forces moved in following the airstrike, NATO said.

Thursday was the ninth anniversary of the American invasion of Afghanistan, a frustrating benchmark for those who expected a quick exit after small targeted special forces toppled the Taliban from power in 2001.

By: Brant