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Pakistan Presses Taliban for "Flexibility" as the Two May Soon Cut Ties
WASHINGTON, Sept 27 (News Agencies) - Pakistan is urging the Taliban to show "flexibility" over U.S. demands, as U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage hinted Thursday that the Afghan neighbor, now the sole country to recognize the Taliban, is likely to soon sever ties with the Islamic militia, leaving Afghanistan entirely isolated from the international community.
"Pakistan is the last country to have relations with the Taliban," Armitage said on NBC television, according to Agence France-Presse (AFP).
"I think it's becoming increasingly difficult for Pakistan to hold that relationship and it'll be another case of a country having to make a choice in the not too distant future," he said.
Armitage disputed the notion that the complete isolation of the Taliban might be counterproductive as the U.S. presses the militia to turn over Saudi dissident Osama bin Laden.
"I think they're a self-isolating government right now and I don't think it would be counterproductive," he said.
At the same time, Armitage said that the United States did not object to Pakistan talking with the Taliban as long as they were sending the message that bin Laden, the U.S. government's prime suspect in the September 11th terrorist attacks in New York and Washington, had to be handed over.
"Pakistan is welcome to continue talking to the Taliban as long as they're sending the same message that the president sent," he said, referring to President George W. Bush's demands that bin Laden be turned over and that his al-Qaeda network be demolished.
Meanwhile, Pakistan called Thursday on Afghanistan's ruling Taliban militia to show greater "flexibility" in its response to intense international pressure to hand over bin Laden.
In a sign of Islamabad's growing frustration with the intransigence of its Taliban allies, Interior Minister Moinuddin Haider said the Islamic militia needed to listen to the advice of its "friends".
"The international community is expecting [Pakistan] to play a role and we expect the Taliban to show flexibility in their attitude and approach as we have done a lot for the Afghan people," Haider said.
"The Taliban only showed flexibility for one day, when they endorsed the decision of their religious leaders, asking bin Laden to leave Afghanistan at his own convenience," Haider told AFP.
Faced with the threat of punitive U.S. military strikes, the Taliban has repeatedly rejected demands that it hand over bin Laden.
It also claims that bin Laden has "disappeared," making it impossible to serve him with the edict of the country's
ulema (religious scholars) recommending that he be asked to leave Afghanistan voluntarily.
"I do not see any breakthrough, but I am not aware of the latest as there are other officials dealing with the situation," Haider said.
On Monday, Pakistan announced that it had withdrawn all the staff from its embassy in Kabul for security reasons given the possibility of U.S. retaliatory strikes in Afghanistan.
The withdrawal followed a weekend decision by the United Arab Emirates to break off relations with the Taliban, and came a day before Saudi Arabia took the same measure.
Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates were the only two countries in the world other than Pakistan to recognize the Taliban as the legitimate government of Afghanistan.
"The combination of the UAE and laterally the Saudis cutting off the ties was a great victory for President Bush and this coalition," Armitage said.
"I think slowly the Taliban is seeing the noose tightening and they'll have to make a choice soon" about whether to hand over bin Laden.
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