Nato has reinforced troops along the Afghan border anticipating peace deals between Pakistan and the Taliban will allow the insurgents to launch more attacks into Afghanistan, Nato's commander in Afghanistan said.
"Our analysis of the previous peace deals ... is that when that dialogue is ongoing or when talks have been consummated in peace deals we see a spike in the untoward events that we experience on our side of the border," said General Dan McNeill, commander of Nato's 47,000-strong International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan.
Nato says there has already been a sharp increase in militant attacks in eastern Afghanistan, the area closest to the parts of Pakistan where peace talks are underway. Mostly US troops are responsible for helping Afghan forces patrol mountainous region.
"We are going to have a bit of a plus-up in the US sector," McNeill told Reuters. "Because we expect more activity there, we attune some of our intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance processes and systems to focus where we anticipate things."
ISAF, some 12,000 troops in a separate US-led coalition force and more than 100,000 Afghan soldiers and police are fighting to contain a Taliban insurgency relaunched two years ago with a guerrilla campaign, backed by suicide and roadside bombs.
"I don't know that Mullah Omar is alive. I don't know if he's dead either," said McNeill. "But I do believe there is a shura and I do believe it is located outside Afghanistan. It might possibly be in one of several Pakistani cities."