Pak. curbs Zaeef's briefings

By B. Muralidhar Reddy

ISLAMABAD, NOV. 6. The Pakistan Government is said to have directed the Taliban embassy here to ``restrict'' its activities and asked its envoy, Mullah Abdul Salaam Zaeef, not to brief the press daily.

The briefings of Mullah Zaeef, who is the only Taliban envoy anywhere in the world, are embarrassing to both Islamabad and Washington as he is not only attracting a good number of journalists but also using the opportunity to launch attacks on the U.S.-led military campaign in Afghanistan.

Today Mullah Zaeef was in the Pakistan Foreign Office but the spokesman, Mr. Aziz Khan, maintained that nothing important was discussed with him.

With a virtual ban by the Taliban on the entry of journalists into Afghanistan and with little credible information coming in, Mullah Zaeef's conferences are a big draw for the several journalists camping here.

After Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates snapped diplomatic ties after the September 11 attacks, Pakistan is the only country that maintains its relations with the Taliban. Islamabad has refused to do so, saying that the Taliban embassy served as a useful window to the rest of the world to carry on humanitarian work inside Afghanistan.

But it appears that the daily briefings and the ``propaganda war'' being carried out from the Embassy premises have proved too much for both Islamabad and Washington. The U.S. Embassy has circulated a backgrounder titled `Catalogue of lies' listing the various Taliban claims since September 30 and, more particularly, after the U.S. began its military campaign on October 7. In his briefing on Monday, Mullah Zaeef sympathised with the families of American soldiers who had died in action and said that those who had not contacted their families after October 20 and later after November 3 should be considered dead.

He claimed 95 U.S. soldiers had been killed in Afghanistan till date and that there was no way of identifying them.

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