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Peshawar, Pakistan (AFP) Oct 10, 2010 NATO supplies through Pakistan's Torkham border crossing into Afghanistan resumed Sunday, 11 days after Islamabad closed the point in response to a deadly NATO air attack, officials said. "The first convoy of more than a dozen vehicles left for Afghanistan this afternoon," customs official Mohammad Nawaz told AFP. More vehicles loaded with supplies for NATO and US troops were ready to leave, he added. Pakistan's foreign ministry on Saturday announced the reopening of the main land route for NATO supplies "with immediate effect". US and NATO forces are fighting a nine-year Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan and the route is vital to the war effort. The decision came after US ambassador to Pakistan Anne Patterson on Wednesday apologised on behalf of the American people for the "terrible accident".
earlier related report "We accept responsibility for the attacks on the NATO supply trucks and tankers in Sibi district on Saturday," Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) spokesman Azam Tariq told AFP. "We will continue the attacks on NATO trucks and tankers until the drone strikes are stopped," he said in a telephone call from an undisclosed location. Gunmen on Saturday torched at least 29 oil tankers in southwest Pakistan, the sixth attack in just over a week on vehicles carrying supplies for the 152,000-strong foreign forces fighting the Taliban-led insurgency. Previous attacks have also been claimed by Taliban. Two police officers were hurt in the attack in remote Mitri area of Sibi district, 180 kilometres (112 miles) southeast of Quetta, the capital of oil and gas rich Baluchistan province, which borders Iran and Afghanistan. "Some 30 gunmen attacked the tankers, which were parked outside a roadside hotel and opened fire early Saturday morning, injuring two local police officials," Abdul Mateen, a senior administration official in Mitri, told AFP. Taliban militants have launched a string of attacks on NATO supply vehicles in Pakistan in the past week to avenge a new wave of US drone strikes targeting Taliban and Al-Qaeda militants in the country's lawless tribal region. Pakistani authorities have reported 26 drone attacks since September 3 which have killed more than 140 people in the region, a hub for homegrown and foreign militants fighting in Afghanistan. The strikes have been linked to a US plan to disrupt an alleged plot by extremists to launch Mumbai-style attacks in Europe. Pakistan late Saturday announced it had decided to reopen the main land route for NATO supplies to Afghanistan and officials at the Torkham border in the northwest Khyber region said the vehicles would start leaving later Sunday.
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