US wants ISI to help in Afghan talks

The New York Times reported Monday that overtures are taking place just a month after President Barack Obamas administration accused Pakistans spy agency of secretly supporting the Haqqani terrorist network, which has mounted attacks on Americans.The revamped approach, which Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has called Fight, Talk, Build, combines continued US air and ground strikes against the Haqqani network and the Taliban with an insistence that Pakistans Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency get them to the negotiating table, the report said.Top US officials including Clinton visited Pakistan this month to press for action against Islamic extremists, particularly the Haqqani network, which is blamed for anti-US attacks in Afghanistan.The efforts at brokering a deal with militants come as early hopes in the White House about having the outlines of a deal ready in time for a multinational conference on Afghanistan on December 5 in Bonn, Germany, have been all but abandoned, The Times noted.Even inside the Obama administration, the new initiative has been met with deep skepticism, in part because the Pakistani government has developed its own strategy, the paper pointed out.One senior US official summarized the Pakistani position as Ceasefire, Talk, Wait (for the Americans to Leave).As the US was the creator of the Taliban, Pakistan was the Talibans chief diplomatic backer when it was in power.