KARACHI - Since last September, North Atlantic Treaty Organization forces in Afghanistan have been pressing Islamabad for the right to conduct extensive hot-pursuit operations into Pakistan to target Taliban and al-Qaeda bases.

According to Asia Times Online contacts, NATO and its US backers have gotten their wish: coalition forces will start hitting targets wherever they might be.

Pakistani President General Pervez Musharraf is expected to make an important announcement on extremism during an address to the nation in the next day or two.

The ATol contacts in Islamabad say that coalition intelligence has pinpointed at least four centers in the tribal areas of North Waziristan and South Waziristan on the border with Afghanistan from which Taliban operations inside Afghanistan are run. These bases include arms caches and the transfer and raising of money and manpower, the latter in the form of foot-soldiers to fight with the Taliban-led insurgency.

Operations inside Pakistan might be carried out independently by the United States, probably with air power, by Pakistani forces acting alone or as joint offensives. In all cases, though, the US will pull the strings, for instance by providing the Pakistanis with information on targets to hit.

Musharraf has apparently already told his military commanders, the National Security Council and decision-makers in government of the development.

Officially, both NATO and Pakistan deny any agreement on hot-pursuit activities. Major John Thomas, spokesman for NATO's International Security Assistance Force, told Asia Times Online, "The ISAF would not strike any targets across the border. That is not part of our mission. We work with the Pakistani government closely on cross-border issues. The ISAF does not have a counter-terrorism mission that I know of."

Similarly, the director general of the Inter-Services Public Relations of the Pakistani Armed Forces, Major-General Waheed Arshad, said NATO forces would not be allowed to intervene in Pakistani areas. He conceded that Pakistan is wary of growing extremism in the country, but said there is no threat of Talibanization.

"The Taliban are a problem for Afghanistan, not Pakistan. There are a few extremist groups operating in Pakistan and we have our own indigenous mechanism to counter them through law-enforcement agencies, and through paramilitary and military deployment," Waheed said.

Nevertheless, the ATol contacts are adamant that an agreement is in place for increased operations on Pakistani soil, given the deteriorating situation in Afghanistan and US fears of al-Qaeda using Pakistan as a base for planning operations in the West. There are precedents.

Last month, US Central Intelligence Agency drones targeted a madrassa in North Waziristan, and 20 people were killed. CIA drones tried to take out al-Qaeda No 2 Dr Ayman al-Zawahiri in January 2006 in Bajur Agency. Zawahiri survived, but 18 people died. In December 2005, al-Qaeda leader Hamza Rabia was killed by a CIA predator aircraft in the town of Mir Ali, North Waziristan.

However, new operations, which could begin within weeks, if not days, are expected to be much larger in scale.

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Hostility to India is not some manufactured creation of Musharif - B

Uh, if you find where I said this I'll give you five bucks. - PD

"Pakistan’s military is complicit in...resurgence of the Taliban, terrorism in Kashmir, and the growth of jihadi extremism and capabilities, says a new report from the Carnegie Endowment."

Q Fran, I think a lot of Americans watching this will have two very simple questions: Where is Osama bin Laden? And why, nearly six years after the President said we would get him, dead or alive, do we not have him? How has he possibly eluded our grasp?

MS. TOWNSEND: Well, there is no question that we have put extraordinary resources against finding him. If I could answer directly, with a pinpoint on a map where he was, he wouldn't be there. So the question is, does he -- it presumes, frankly, that he sits in a single place with an address, a street address and a phone number, so it should be easy for us to go and get him. I wish, Sheryl, that it were that easy. It's not.

You can assume, just based on sort of operational security behavior, that he's moving around, he doesn't make it easy, he doesn't have a lot of contact, and he is in a very remote area that is not easily accessed certainly by Americans, and frankly, by the Pakistanis, themselves.

And so the President has made perfectly clear, we will be relentless. He will be captured or killed. And it is a huge priority for us, for our intelligence and military. And we will continue until we're successful.

Q Can you talk about the extraordinary resources? What kind of resources?

MS. TOWNSEND: Military, intelligence and law enforcement resources.

Q -- operations you can share with us?

MS. TOWNSEND: No.

Q Fran, do you know if Osama bin Laden is still on a dialysis machine, is he still ill? What? I mean, could you tell us about that? I mean, because -- it might be laughable, but people are finding it hard, six years this man is sick, moving around from cave to cave, and can't be found -- with a dialysis machine?

MS. TOWNSEND: Have you ever been to the tribal areas? I suspect not.

Q No, I haven't, but I've seen some great pictures from Ken Herman as to the rough terrain over that way. (Laughter.)

MS. TOWNSEND: It's not exactly easy. If it were easy he'd be dead.

Q But it's not easy for him to travel around with medics and machinery if he's sick. I mean, is he -- do you know from your intelligence if he's still sick? What do you know about that?

MS. TOWNSEND: I'm not going to talk about that.

Thank you.

President Pervez Musharraf and Pakistan’s exiled former prime minister, Benazir Bhutto, have struck an outline power-sharing deal to run Pakistan, ministers said.

Under the reported agreement, struck late on Friday night, Gen Musharraf would step down as commander in chief of the country’s armed forces but would be able to retain the presidency.

Mrs Bhutto would be permitted to return to the country to stand in parliamentary elections, and the constitution would be changed to allow her to become prime minister for a third term.

However, after two rounds of hard-fought negotiations the two sides remain divided on who should hold the post of prime minister meanwhile.

Mrs Bhutto, leader of the main opposition Pakistan People’s Party, is unhappy with the current incumbent, Shaukat Aziz, whom she regards as too close to Gen Musharraf. She has made it clear that she wants an impartial alternative to ensure free and fair elections and has proposed Hamid Nasir Chatta, a senior politician who has served as speaker of the national assembly.

Gen Musharraf, however, favours Iftikhar Shah, Pakistan’s ambassador to Turkey.

[Sher Afghan Niazi, a minister in Musharraf's cabinet] said the pair had decided that presidential elections should be held in September, during the current parliament, and that if Mrs Bhutto’s party won the subsequent parliamentary elections due in November, she would become prime minister.

However, General Musharraf, a key western ally, still faces an uphill battle to be reelected by the current parliament. The country’s chief justice, Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, is expected to rule any such attempt unconstitutional.

Facing one of the worst crises of his eight year rule, Gen Musharraf has been weakened by his unsuccessful attempt to remove Mr Chaudhry from office, a decision which was overturned by Pakistan’s supreme court.

The Bush administration said it was deeply disturbed by the emergency and urged a swift return to democracy. But the Pentagon said Musharraf's declaration does not affect U.S. military support of Pakistan, suggesting to many here it will be business as usual.

Washington has provided billions of dollars in military and economic assistance since it suspended sanctions on military aid to Islamabad after 9/11.

“The lawyers should convey my message to the people to rise up and restore the Constitution,” the chief justice, Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, told dozens of lawyers on speakerphone at a meeting of the Islamabad Bar Association before his cellphone line was cut. “I am under arrest now, but soon I will also join you in your struggle.”