ISLAMABAD: Emboldened by the army chief’s rebuff to troops operation in the northwestern Pakistan region bordering Afghanistan by the American forces, the opposition found the iron hot to strike at a government it considered a US ally until about a month ago and demanded that Parliament be summoned forthwith to debate the situation.

The decision by the United States to operate inside Pakistan territory to flush out and destroy alleged Taleban or Al-Qaeda extremists from their “sanctuaries”, is turning into a major issue in Pakistan after media began a campaign against President George W. Bush and others for secretly endorsing such a strategy. Voices, muted though, were first raised by politicians like Sheikh Rashid, and a couple of others, but soon retired ambassadors and army generals like Hameed Gul, Talat Masood, Mohammad Tariq, Tariq Fatimi, Tanveer Ahmad, and others joined the chorus. The tempo seems to have picked up and although no large-scale protests have been witnessed, such a possibility cannot be ruled out once the holy month of Ramadan is over.

The Jamaat-e-Islami has announced a chain of agitations next month on a different subject but perhaps it would be easier to exploit the anti-American sentiments in the public.

Former minister Chahdury Nisar Ali Khan, a close confidante of Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz chief Nawaz Sharif, took the lead in a political platform by describing the situation on Pak-Afghan border (in Bajaur agency, Swat and adjoining areas) as “critical” and has urged the party in power to call the joint session of the two houses of the Parliament to discuss the “sensitive subject.”

The phraseology he used was of special characteristics. He picked Asif Ali Zardari and Yousaf Raza Gilani by saying that “the president and the prime minister (of Pakistan) should have said what Gen. Kiyani had to say.” Nisar looked angry with the government’s response during the last few days over the American missile attacks on Pakistan and landing of US commandos to operate inside 20 km of Pakistani soil along the Afghan border.

He was not alone. There has been a general feeling that the government had acted rather uniquely to moves from alien forces. The government did pass resolutions in National Assembly and the Senate on the landing of US troops in Pakistan but kept silent on the successive four missile attacks from drones, violating the Pakistani airspace with impunity.

Meanwhile as many as 14 people were killed in the northwestern region of North Waziristan yesterday in a missile attack by a pilotless US aircraft on suspected militants near the Afghan border, security officials said. The strike, near the town of Miranshah, was the first since a recent surge in tension between Pakistan and the United States.

Residents said two missiles were fired at a former government school where militants and their families were living. Security forces stepped up offensives in two areas in August, the Bajaur region on the Afghan border and the Swat Valley in North West Frontier Province. Hundreds of people have been killed in the fighting including 100 militants in Bajaur on Thursday, the military said.

Hours after yesterday’s missile strike, a roadside bomb hit a security convoy in a nearby village, seriously wounding two soldiers. Soldiers in the convoy opened fire after the blast, wounding four civilians, residents said.

— With input from agencies