Militants call for end of war on terror

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (AP) — Taliban-style militants battling government forces in northwest Pakistan said Sunday they wanted dialogue with the winners of parliamentary elections and urged the new leadership to abandon President Pervez Musharraf’s war on terror.

The party of slain opposition leader Benazir Bhutto, which will lead the new government, called for an end to military operations against autonomy-minded insurgents in another restive area — the southwestern province of Baluchistan where the U.S.-backed Afghan government believes the Taliban leadership may be hiding.

Opposition parties trounced Musharraf’s allies in Feb. 18 parliamentary elections — widely seen as a public repudiation of Musharraf’s policies including his alliance with Washington in the war on terror.

Maulvi Umar, spokesman for the Islamic militant Tehrik-e-Taliban, said his group welcomed the victory of anti-Musharraf parties and was anxious to talk with them about ways to bring peace to northwestern tribal areas, where U.S. officials believe Osama bin Laden himself may be hiding.

U.S. and Pakistani officials have blamed the leader of the Tehrik-e-Taliban, Baitullah Mehsud, for masterminding Bhutto’s Dec. 27 assassination. Her Pakistan People’s Party finished first in the vote last Monday.

More than 80,000 Pakistani soldiers have been battling Islamic extremists in the mountainous northwest, but have failed to crush the insurgency. A suspected militant attack late Saturday on a government checkpoint near Peshawar, in northwestern Pakistan, killed two paramilitary soldiers and one policeman, local police official Zulfikar Khan said.

However, U.S. officials fear a dialogue-based strategy may end up giving al-Qaida and other hardline Islamists a sanctuary in Pakistan. American officials believe a 10-month cease-fire in mountainous North Waziristan, which collapsed last year, enabled al-Qaida and Afghan Taliban fighters to regroup after being driven by U.S.-led forces from Afghanistan.