The US pressure on Pakistan to crack-down on terrorist groups, especially the Al Qaeda, may finally be showing results.
According to a report in <i>The Guardian</i>, the recent arrests in Pakistan, which appear to have sparked security alerts in Britain and the US, followed months of work against Al Qaeda suspects in the region.
The report says Pakistani officials claim to have arrested more than 450 Al Qaeda or Taliban suspects since the Afghan regime was toppled, including a recently captured "high-value target."
But there is also concern that Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf may be stage-managing these arrests. The report quotes an unnamed British observer of Pakistani affairs as saying that Musharraf has a remarkable knack of "producing suspects out of a hat whenever he has reasons to do so."
The arrest of Ahmed Khalfan Ghailani on July 25 was Pakistan's biggest success since last year, when it seized Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.
The Bush Administration has been putting pressure on the Pakistani government to up its efforts to capture bin Laden. According a recent report in a US magazine, the White House suggested that the first three days of the Democratic Convention would be the best time for such arrests.
US officials say privately they have had to constantly press Pakistan to keep up its efforts.
In March this year Pakistan conducted a major operation in its tribal provinces bordering Afghanistan. In that almost war-like effort, the target was Ayman al-Zawahiri, the Al Qaeda No. 2.
Though al-Zawahiri managed to escape, Pakistan demonstrated its will to take on the militants.
The rewards were there for everyone to see. In May, the five-year suspension of Pakistan's Commonwealth membership was lifted.
The country was also hailed as a major non-Nato ally of both the US and Britain. Not too many questions were asked over the role of its nuclear expert, Abdul Qadeer Khan, in selling technology to Iran, Libya and North Korea. There was financial gains too.
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