Haqqani Denies Link With Pakistan

The Haqqani network has no ties to Pakistan’s ISI and isn’t responsible for the assassination of former Afghan president Burhanuddin Rabbani, Siraj Haqqani tells the BBC. Siraj is the son of Haqqani network founder and namesake Jalaluddin Haqqani, and is a major leader within the group. “We’ve had contacts with many countries’ intelligence services,” he said, "but none to our benefit." He said the US was trying to tie the group to the ISI to "confuse people's minds."

Haqqani also denied attacking the US embassy in Kabul, blaming it instead on a military council of the “Islamic Emirate”—the Taliban’s name for Afghanistan. The US does not appear convinced; this week American and Afghan troops launched a major operation in the Charbaran Valley to block one of the main routes Haqqani fighters take into Afghanistan, sweeping nearby villages for militants, the New York Times reports. One commander called it “a spoiling attack to prevent a spectacular attack in the Kabul area.” (More Burhanuddin Rabbani stories.)