WASHINGTON, Jan 21: Pakistan has strongly rejected allegations that Mullah Omar, the Taliban leader, is hiding in Quetta, according to a Washington Post report, which also quoted Nato commanders in Afghanistan as acknowledging Pakistan's efforts and saying the country had helped international forces there far more than is widely known.

In the Islamabad-datelined report published on Sunday, the Director-General of ISPR, Maj-Gen Shaukat Sultan and Governor NWFP Ali Jan Mohammad Aurakzai forcefully defended Islamabad's efforts to curb illegal cross-border activities.

“The Pakistan government does not wish to see the Taliban in power here,” Lt-Gen David Richards, the outgoing Nato commander in Kabul, said in an interview recently, the report added. He said Pakistan deserves much appreciation for its cooperation.

“They are determined to bear down on the insurgency. But when they help us, they get no credit for it. No one says thank you,” the Nato commander stated.

In remarks carried by the Post report, Gen Sultan rebutted statements by the Taliban spokesman arrested last week in Afghanistan that Mulla Omar has been hiding in Quetta.

He was quoted as saying that the Pakistani officials repeatedly had asked Afghan and the US authorities to provide them with solid information on Omar's location but had received none. He said the captured Taliban spokesman had lied about Omar's whereabouts after being tortured by interrogators in Afghanistan.

Gen Sultan did not rule out the possibility of militants crossings on the porous border but emphasised that a major proportion of the problem lies on the Afghan side.

In the context of Pakistan's efforts, the report also referred to President Pervez Musharraf's statement at a meeting of the National Security Council in which he vowed strong punitive action against illegal cross-border actions and against any terrorists seeking refuge in Pakistan.

In a separate interview on Friday, quoted in the same story, Ali Jan Mohammed Aurakzai, the governor of NWFP, asserted that the peace pact in the tribal area of Waziristan had been successful in some ways.

He, however, pointed out that the Afghan government had been unable to extend control or services in much of the country and was largely to blame for the revival of the Taliban insurgency.

—APP

Our correspondent adds from Washington: Elements within the Pakistani establishment and the country’s religious parties are supporting the Taliban resurgence along the Afghan border, said the New York Times on Sunday.

Pakistani officials strongly denied such allegations, saying it supports the US and Nato forces that drove Taliban militants from control in Afghanistan in 2001, the Times said. But the newspaper said interviews with many residents indicate Pakistani officials are “encouraging” the Taliban.

“The Pakistanis are actively supporting the Taliban,” a Western diplomat told the newspaper. But analysts told the Times that Pakistani officials are preparing for the day when Western troops will leave Afghanistan.

Pakistani military intelligence agencies, particularly the powerful ISI, support a Taliban restoration, motivated not only by religious fervour but also by a longstanding view that the jihadist movement allows them to assert greater influence on the country’s "vulnerable" western flank, the report said.