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Afghan revolt becoming ‘liberation war’: Orakzai

PESHAWAR: Taliban-led insurgents are winning ever-greater public support in Afghanistan for a struggle that is taking on the character of a “liberation war” against foreign troops, NWFP Governor Ali Mohammed Jan Orakzai said on Friday.

He said cross-border attacks accounted for only a fraction of the insurgency in Afghanistan. The main reason for the Taliban’s return was the frustration of ethnic Pashtuns seeking more political say in Kabul and resentment of ongoing military operations and the lack of economic aid in the south and east of Afghanistan, he said. “Today, they’ve reached the stage that a lot of the local population has started supporting the militant operations and it is developing into some sort of a nationalist movement, a resistance movement, sort of a liberation war against coalition forces,” Orakzai told a news conference. Orakzai defended a September peace deal with pro-Taliban militants in North Waziristan. Pakistan-based militants may cause, at most, “20 percent of the problem in Afghanistan,” he said. He forecast that militants would take years to defeat and the Kabul government and its foreign backers would one day have to negotiate with the Taliban. Orakzai said coalition forces in Afghanistan must match Pakistan’s commitment to preventing the cross-border infiltration. agencies

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