China-Pakistani military drill not targeted at India

Last updated: 2 hours ago

- File Photo

BEIJING: Brushing aside New Delhi media’s frenzy over joint anti-terrorism exercise, the Ministry of National Defence here has dismissed Indian reports that China and Pakistan are holding a joint military exercise to put pressure on New Delhi, and said the anti-terror drill is not targeted at any third country.
According to the annual exchange plan between China and Pakistan’s militaries, the two armies will hold the ‘Friendship 2011′ joint anti-terror exercise near Islamabad, The China Daily quoted the Information Office of the Ministry of National Defence.
“This is the first joint drill of the two armies this year and is not targeted at any third nation. It is aimed at enhancing the capability of the two militaries to handle non-traditional security threats and launch joint anti-terror activities,” the office said in a written reply.
The two-week exercise will begin on Nov 16, it said.
Fu Xiaoqiang, an expert on South Asian studies at the China Institutes of Contemporary International Relations, while rejecting the report accused the Indian media of basing such reports on “hearsay evidence”.
“They always wear blinkers to examine China cooperation with Pakistan.
For example, we all know there are many Chinese experts and engineers in Pakistan working on large projects. It is the Indian media which linked that with security issues,” he said.
Premier Wen Jiabao suggested that the Indian media should stop overplaying security issues and make more positive efforts to improve bilateral relations, when he visited the country last year.
The premier said that, in recent years, there has been no conflict in the China-India border area.
“But the border issue has been hyped as a rather serious problem.”

Afghan soldier turns gun on Australian troops, wounds three

Last updated: 2 hours ago

An Afghan soldier shot and wounded three Australian and two Afghan troops . — Photo by AFP

KABUL: An Afghan soldier shot and wounded three Australian and two Afghan troops in southern Afghanistan, the third such surprise attack against Australians in the past five months, officials said on Wednesday.
The shooting comes after a string of attacks by “rogue” soldiers and police, or by insurgents who have infiltrated security forces.
Such attacks are especially damaging as the Afghan National Army (ANA) tries to win public trust before Afghan forces take full responsibility for security nationwide.
Foreign combat troops are due to leave Afghanistan at the end of 2014.
The ANA soldier opened fire with a grenade launcher and an automatic weapon from a position overlooking a patrol base in Uruzgan province late on Tuesday, Australia’s Defence Force commander David Hurley said.
The Australian soldiers sustained wounds that were not life-threatening but serious, while the two Afghan soldiers also shot at the base were in a satisfactory condition, Hurley and a spokesman for the Nato-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan said.
The Afghan soldier fled the scene in an army vehicle, Hurley said. ISAF said a search for him was still underway.
Tuesday’s shooting followed a similar attack less than two weeks ago in Kandahar, southern Afghanistan, when an Afghan soldier shot and killed three Australian soldiers and an Afghani interpreter.
In May, an Afghan soldier killed an Australian service member who had been mentoring the Afghan army, ISAF said, an attack which also took place in Uruzgan province.
The Afghan soldier was later killed when he refused arrest, ISAF said.
The latest shooting prompted the Australian Greens political party to renew their call for Australia to withdraw its forces from Afghanistan, where it has around 1,500 troops.
But Prime Minister Julia Gillard, who made a surprise visit to Kabul in the past week, said Australia would stick with its military commitments in Afghanistan.
“As distressing as these incidents are, as dreadful as these incidents are, our mission in Afghanistan does need to continue,” Gillard told reporters in Melbourne.
“Training is pivotal to that mission and our purpose in Afghanistan is to deny Afghanistan as a country in which terrorists can train to wreak violence around the world.”
In September, an Afghan guard employed by the US embassy opened fire inside a CIA office in Kabul, killing an American contractor.