Pakistan shuns summit after Nato airstrikes kill 24 troops

PAKISTAN said yesterday it would boycott an international conference on Afghanistan next week in protest at the deaths of 24 its soldiers in a Nato airstrike.

It insists the cross-border attack was unprovoked and has closed its border with Afghanistan to Nato supply convoys and put the alliance under review.

The decision to withdraw from the Bonn conference, which starts in Germany on Monday, comes amid public anger directed at a government and military often accused of being American stooges in the war on terror.

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Pakistan looks forward to the success of this conference but in view of developments and prevailing circumstances has decided not to participate in the conference,” said a statement released after a cabinet meeting in the eastern city of Lahore.

More than 90 countries are due to take part in the Bonn conference to plot a course for the stabilisation of Afghanistan as Nato forces prepare to pull out.

However, its success has long hinged on the participation of Pakistan. US strategy relies in part on using Pakistani influence over militant groups to force them into talks.

While few expected a breakthrough in Bonn, Pakistan’s withdrawal makes progress more difficult.

German chancellor Angela Merkel said she hoped Pakistan would reconsider. She said: “They should still understand the Afghanistan conference is a very important one. It’s a very good opportunity to bring forward the political process.”

Yesterday, US officials offered their version of what happened early on Saturday at a vital border crossing in Mohmand, Pakistan. The preliminary US report suggest it was a case of mistaken identity. An AC-130 gunship and Apache attack helicopters trained their sights on what they believed was a Taleban training camp. They intervened when a US and Afghan patrol requested air support after being hit my mortar and small arms fire in the early hours of Saturday. Commanders first checked with the Pakistani military, who told them they had no troops in the area. According to the report, about two hours later the US commander spotted what he took to be a insurgent camp, with heavy weapons on tripods, and called in an airstrike.

Pakistan strongly disputes this version of events.

Yesterday, General Ashfaq Nadeem, director general of military operations, described the attack as an act of “unprovoked aggression”.

He said there had been no cross-border co-ordination and that Nato had breached standard operating procedures.

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Though Pakistan appears at loggerheads with the US, diplomats expect the relationship will be mended, after Pakistan gets an apology and is given a greater say in Afghanistan.

Imtiaz Gul, director of Islamabad’s Centre for Research and Security Studies, said: “They will patch things up. After all it’s a relationship based on need and there’s no reason why they can’t keep a businesslike relationship going for years.”

An Afghan diplomat in Kabul described the Pakistan reaction as “a pretty huge miscalculation.”

“The agenda of Bonn does not depend on Pakistan, nor does its success depend on Pakistan,” a British Foreign Office figure said. “But it would be better for Pakistan if she were there. There is a slight risk of the Pakistanis disenfranchising themselves.”