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Pakistan, reacting to Britain's call that it do more to eliminate al-Qaida leaders, said
nobody should doubt its efforts to fight terrorism.
Pakistani Foreign Office spokesman Abdul Basit told a private television channel Sunday
world leaders should make available to Pakistan intelligence on the possible whereabouts of Osama bin Laden and other al-Qaida leaders instead of publicly saying the country is not doing enough to fight terrorism.
Basit's comments came in response to British Prime Minister Gordon Brown's telling the BBC Pakistan must make "more progress in taking out" bin Laden and his second-in-command, Ayman Zawahiri, who are believed to be holed up in the country's tribal areas, the state-run Associated Press of Pakistan reported.
With more international troops expected to be deployed in neighboring Afghanistan, Brown told the BBC Pakistan has "to be able to show that it can take on al-Qaida."
Separately, a U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee report said U.S. forces had come close to taking out the al-Qaida leader in Afghanistan in December 2001 but did not commit enough forces to accomplish the task, allowing him to escape to Pakistan.
During the last seven to eight years, Basit said, Pakistan has either captured or killed more than 700 al-Qaida operatives.
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