Alliance Update: Top Pakistan Diplomat Criticises US Terror Warning

As Islambad continues to block the movement of NATO tankers through the Khyber Pass to Afghanistan, leaving them prey to attack, and Washington criticises Pakistan's lack of fortitude in pursuing insurgents --- even accusing the Pakistani intelligence service of backing the Taliban in Afghanistan --- the latest spat is described in The Guardian of London.

Senior Pakistani diplomats, as well as European intelligence officials, are telling journalists that a US terror alert this week about Al Qa'eda plots to attack targets in western Europe was politically motivated and unsupported by credible intelligence. 

Wajid Shamsul Hasan, the high commissioner to Britain, claimed that the American alert was an attempt to excuse the recent escalation in US drone and helicopter attacks inside Pakistan. Those attacks prompted Islamabad's roadblack on the NATO tankers when three Pakistani soldiers were killed by helicopters on a cross-border raid from Afghanistan. 

Hasan also suggested the Obama Administration was looking at domestic politics:

I will not deny the fact that there may be internal political dynamics, including the forthcoming mid-term American elections. If the Americans have definite information about terrorists and al-Qaida people, we should be provided [with] that and we could go after them ourselves.

Such reports are a mixture of frustrations, ineptitude and lack of appreciation of ground realities. Any attempt to infringe the sovereignty of Pakistan would not bring about stability in Afghanistan, which is presumably the primary objective of the American and Nato forces.

Hasan continued, "Why are they putting so much pressure on us? It is a threat to the democratic syste....But people in Pakistan feel Washington does not care."

German Minister of Interior Thomas de Maizière said he saw no sign of an imminent attack on Germany and described the danger in the US alert as "hypothetical".

An unnamed US official responded, "Our allies have been briefed on the nature of the threat and the intelligence that led to the travel alert and everyone understands this cannot be taken lightly. To try to ascribe any political motivation is misguided and irresponsible."