Afghan truck drivers who haul fuel and other goods through Pakistan's tribal areas tell RFE/RL that Pakistani Taliban have threatened reprisals against anyone carrying gasoline, diesel fuel, or kerosene into Afghanistan.
The fuel threat is reportedly worded to include "legal or illegal" shipments, suggesting a willingness to target the many residents who regularly shuttle goods across the border.
Radio Free Afghanistan's Peshawar correspondent also says hauliers have received word that a Taliban council will decide "soon" whether or not militants will "permit" similar cross-border shipments of food and other necessities.
The intimidation follows by just a few weeks a major military campaign to safeguard the Northwest Frontier Province's capital, Peshawar, against the threat of a Taliban takeover.
So whatever their actual ability to interdict military or civilian supply lines (two of the international forces' major supply routes originating in Karachi run through the tribal areas), Taliban-style militants are busily trying to create the impression of an increased presence in the Pakistani tribal regions.
-- Andy Heil
The fuel threat is reportedly worded to include "legal or illegal" shipments, suggesting a willingness to target the many residents who regularly shuttle goods across the border.
Radio Free Afghanistan's Peshawar correspondent also says hauliers have received word that a Taliban council will decide "soon" whether or not militants will "permit" similar cross-border shipments of food and other necessities.
The intimidation follows by just a few weeks a major military campaign to safeguard the Northwest Frontier Province's capital, Peshawar, against the threat of a Taliban takeover.
So whatever their actual ability to interdict military or civilian supply lines (two of the international forces' major supply routes originating in Karachi run through the tribal areas), Taliban-style militants are busily trying to create the impression of an increased presence in the Pakistani tribal regions.
-- Andy Heil
