Taliban militants withdraw from Pakistan's Buner

Scores of Taliban fighters moved into Buner, a district only 100 kilometres (62 miles) from Islamabad, sparking US warnings that Islamist advances pose "an existential threat" to the nuclear-armed Muslim nation bordering Afghanistan.

Officials confirmed the Taliban "withdrawal" but said local Taliban remained in Buner. Neither did the Taliban show any sign of lessening their grip on neighbouring Swat, a former tourist resort plunged into brutal insurgency.

"I do not know the exact number of my men who left the area but they all boarded in 15 vehicles to return to Swat," said Muslim Khan, the main Taliban spokesman in the area who presented the "withdrawal" as a goodwill gesture.

"We have withdrawn from Buner to show our commitment to make the peace deal a success," Khan said referring to a controversial agreement to enforce Islamic law in part of northwest Pakistan in exchange for an end to fighting in Swat.

He did not disclose how many "local Taliban" remained in Buner.

The government in North West Frontier Province (NWFP) slammed the Taliban advance on Buner as a violation of that agreement, which the authorities have come under increasing Western and domestic pressure to rescind.

The Taliban has shown no sign of disarming as demanded by the government.

"We will not exhibit arms as part of the deal. But our government should stop its policy of appeasing the US," the Taliban spokesman said.

The government on Saturday deployed up to 300 extra paramilitary police to secure Buner, local police said, but army chief General Ashfaq Kayani defended a decision by the military not to intervene as "tactical" despite US pressure.

"We have full control in the area and the Taliban have completely withdrawn," local administration official Javed Ahmad told AFP.

David Petraeus, the US commander for southwest Asia, warned that the banned Pakistan-based group Lashkar-e-Taiba, whom India blamed for last year's Mumbai attacks, were plotting further violence to further destabilise the region.

"We think they're trying to do more damage and they're trying to carry out additional attacks," Petraeus told US lawmakers on Friday.

The November 26-29 Islamist militant attacks in Mumbai left more than 160 people dead and over 300 injured when armed gunmen rampaged through India's financial capital.

The United States expects "extremists that are trying to cause that kind of tension and also to take (Pakistan's) focus off of the internal extremist threat would indeed strive to do that," Petraeus said.

The United States insists that Islamist extremists, historically supported by Pakistani intelligence, pose the greatest threat to the country and not arch rival India -- as traditionally viewed by the Pakistan's powerful military.

Domestic critics are increasingly presenting the same arguments, although for now the Pakistani authorities have vowed to stick by the sharia law deal.

Extremist attacks have killed more than 1,800 people since July 2007.

"By going into Buner without any resistance and withdrawing, the Taliban showed they could do all these things at will," said analyst A.H.Nayyar.

"I think whenever there is slightest chance of coming back, they will again try and challenge the state," he added.

Nayyar said the recent bail of hardline cleric, Maulana Abdul Aziz, who was arrested during a 2007 siege on the radical Red Mosque in Islamabad and who calls for an Islamic order across Pakistan, also strengthened the Taliban hand.

"There are many, many more (Taliban), situated everywhere and when they will find the first opportunity, they will try and stage an uprising".

"We do not know how many more mosques in Islamabad are stuffed with jihadis, weapons and suicide bombers," he said.

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