US and Pakistani armed forces have agreed to conduct a joint investigation into a US air strike that killed 11 soldiers this week, US Assistant Secretary of State Richard Boucher said on Friday.
"There is an understanding between the militaries that they will conduct a joint investigation and the foreign ministers agreed that that was the right way to go," he told reporters after a meeting between US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and her Pakistani counterpart Shah Mehmood Qureshi in Paris.
US officials have expressed regret for the deaths but have said that the strike was a legitimate action carried out in self-defence after US troops on the Afghan side of the border came under attack. Qureshi, who like Rice was in Paris to attend an Afghan donors conference on Thursday, said a US drone had instead shot at soldiers and that such "tragic incidents" only helped the extremist cause.
"The people who have died have been identified and there is no confusion about their identity. How can you deny facts? Those facts will be put forward when the joint investigation takes place and hopefully we will get to the bottom of the story," he said before his talks with Rice.
While saying that he thought a joint investigation would be useful, Qureshi also called on the United States to co-operate much more with the Pakistani military. Washington has invited Pakistani and Afghan officials to help look into the attack, which occurred in a region where al Qaeda and Taliban militants are believed to have taken refuge after Afghanistan's Taliban government was toppled in 2001.
Qureshi said the killings would not help relations with Washington and risked undermining Pakistan's efforts to bring peace to the semi-autonomous tribal areas bordering Afghanistan.
"These incidents do not help (relations). We want to get the support of the local population. Such incidents damage this environment and do not help," he said. Some US officials have questioned whether the Pakistan government is going too far in its efforts to improve ties with leaders in the tribal regions and is effectively enabling the militants to regroup.
While Rice and Qureshi discussed the need for security, economic development and co-operation with the tribes in the border areas, Boucher said they also talked about "the need to avoid compromises with militants, with the extremists."
"We do have misgivings about some of the things that we see going on these days," he said, referring to negotiations that the new government has undertaken in the Swat and Waziristan regions.
Qureshi denied his government was enabling militants to regroup, saying it was committed to defeating terrorist networks and had not withdrawn troops from the area or "given up the military option." "We have sent a message to this extreme fringe element that we want to settle affairs, but if they cannot live and abide by Pakistani law we will be forced to take action," he said.
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