Pakistan Denies Taliban Accusations

A classified NATO report obtained by the BBC, based on thousands of interrogations, concludes that the Taliban has widespread support among the Afghan people and is being directly assisted by Pakistan’s intelligence service. Pakistan's foreign minister strongly rejected the report, while a senior security official in Islamabad said the report was the result of Western troops losing ground in Afghanistan. The NATO report is based on 27,000 interrogations of more than 4,000 captured Taliban and al Qaeda members as well as civilians. One senior al Qaeda detainee says, “The Taliban are not Islam. The Taliban are Islamabad.” The report also says that the Taliban are increasingly popular in Afghanistan.