China warns US on Asia military strategy

China's state media have warned the US against "flexing its muscles" after Washington unveiled a defence review switching focus to the Asia-Pacific.

In an editorial, official news agency Xinhua said President Barack Obama's move to increase US presence in the region could come as a welcome boost to stability and prosperity.

But it said any US militarism could create ill will and "endanger peace".

Mr Obama also plans $450bn (£290bn) in cuts to create a "leaner" military.

Thousands of troops are expected to be axed over the next decade under the far-reaching defence review.

The defence budget could also lose another $500bn at the end of this year after Congress failed to agree on deficit reduction following a debt-ceiling deal in August 2011.

Mr Obama said the "tide of war was receding" in Afghanistan and that the US must renew its economic power.Regional disputes

However, he told reporters at the Pentagon: "We'll be strengthening our presence in the Asia-Pacific, and budget reductions will not come at the expense of this critical region."

Xinhua said the US role could be good for China in helping to secure the "peaceful environment" it needed to continue its economic development.

But it added: "While boosting its military presence in the Asia-Pacific, the United States should abstain from flexing its muscles, as this won't help solve regional disputes.

"If the United States indiscreetly applies militarism in the region, it will be like a bull in a china shop, and endanger peace instead of enhancing regional stability."

BBC Asia analyst Charles Scanlon said the US decision to focus on Asia would have come as no surprise to China's leaders. However, to some in Beijing, it would look like a containment strategy designed to curtail China's growing power.

Beijing officials have yet to comment.

However, the Communist Party's Global Times newspaper said Washington could not stop the rise of China and called on Beijing to develop more long-range strike weapons to deter the US navy.

'Flexible and ready'

The US strategy shifts the Pentagon away from its long-standing doctrine of being able to wage two wars simultaneously.

However, Defence Secretary Leon Panetta emphasised the military would retain its ability to confront more than one threat at a time, and would be more flexible and adaptable than in the past.

Mr Obama said: "The world must know - the United States is going to maintain our military superiority with armed forces that are agile, flexible and ready for the full range of contingencies and threats."

No specific cuts to troop numbers or weapons programmes were announced on Thursday - those are to be presented as part of the federal budget next month.

But a 10-15% reduction to the US Army and the Marine Corps is being considered over the next decade - amounting to tens of thousands of troops, Obama administration officials have told US media.

Initial Republican reaction to the review was negative. Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, California Representative Howard McKeon, said the new policy was a "retreat from the world in the guise of a new strategy".

"This is a lead-from-behind strategy for a left-behind America," he said in a statement.

Pakistan Taliban free 17 kidnapped youths from Bajaur

The Taliban have freed 17 young men from north-west Pakistan who they seized four months ago, officials say.


About 30 youths were abducted in early September after they inadvertently strayed across the Afghan border.

Several managed to escape over the past few months. At least eight more are still being held by the militants, an official in Bajaur tribal area said.

The Taliban said they kidnapped members of the Mamund tribe because it supported the Pakistani government.

Over the past few years, influential members of the Mamund tribe have sided with the Pakistani military and raised private militias to fight the Taliban. The Pakistani government says the co-operation has helped clear the area of Taliban influence.

The youths, reportedly ranging in age from 10 to about 30 years old, were at a picnic to celebrate the Muslim festival of Eid and had mistakenly crossed the border from Bajaur to take a bath in a spring, when the militants seized them.

At the time of the kidnap there were reports that the militants had demanded Taliban prisoners be released. But local administration officials told the AFP news agency that the 17 youths had been "freed unconditionally".


Two boys who escaped in October spoke extensively to the media about their ordeal.

Securing the long, porous border between Pakistan and Afghanistan has long posed a major challenge to the authorities.

The Pakistani government says that many militants have based themselves across the border in Afghanistan's eastern province of Kunar, from where they are known to have carried out attacks in north-western Pakistan.

NATO wants relations with Pakistan back on track

KABUL: Nato wants to get relations with Pakistan back on track “as quickly as possible” to reopen its key supply route for foreign troops fighting in Afghanistan, a coalition spokesman said Monday.

Pakistan closed Nato supply route to Afghanistan in November, choking supply line for the 130,000-strong US-led force, following a deadly air strike by the alliance force that killed 24 Pakistani soldiers on the border.

Islamabad had rejected the coalition’s report that blamed the incident on mistakes by both sides and has not said when it will reopen the route.

“We have an interest…for Afghanistan that relations with Pakistan should normalise as quickly as possible,” said Brigadier General Carsten Jacobsen.

“We are aware that there are things that are not travelling to Afghanistan because they are stuck at border control points.

“It mainly affects the economy, wages and work for people who are in the transport business in Pakistan and Afghanistan.”

The spokesman for Nato’s International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) however sought to allay concerns among Afghans that the route blockage would force the coalition to buy locally and force a hike in the price of fuel and food.

“The people of Afghanistan will not be challenged by Nato buying their fuel and their food. Nato’s stockpiles are more than sufficient,” he said.

A Pakistani official earlier said that Nato military vehicles and supplies were piling up at the docks, with truck drivers unable to drive them to the northwestern border to cross into Afghanistan.

“At present, a total of 3,676 military vehicles and 1,732 containers belonging to Nato forces are at the port,” a port official told AFP on condition of anonymity.

It was reported earlier, that the US has decided to export all its cargo, including military hardware and arms, out of Pakistan.

Sources told Express News that the break in supplies has frustrated US authorities to the point where they are now weighing various options to move around the cargo stranded at various locations in Pakistan.

The deadly incident heightened tensions in an already fragile relationship between the US and Pakistan, with Pakistani officials alleging deliberate US targeting of their troops at border posts.

Obama’s New Years gift: Signs bill freezing aid to Pakistan

HONOLULU: President Barack Obama signed a sweeping US defense funding bill on Saturday which includes new sanctions on financial institutions dealing with Iran’s central bank, and curtailing up to $850 million in aid to Pakistan. The bill was signed despite concerns about sections that expand the US military’s authority over terrorism suspects and limit his powers in foreign affairs.

The massive defense bill Congress passed on earlier in December freezes 60 per cent of the $850 million aid, or $510 million, until the US defense secretary provides lawmakers with assurances that Pakistan is working to counter improvised explosive devices (IEDs). US lawmakers say that many Afghan bombs that kill US troops are made with fertiliser smuggled by militants across the border from Pakistan into Afghanistan.

“The fact that I support this bill as a whole does not mean I agree with everything in it,” Obama said in a statement, citing limits on transferring detainees from the US base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and requirements he notify Congress before sharing some defense missile information with Russia as problematic.

The bill, approved by Congress last week after its language was revised, aims with its Iran sanctions to reduce Tehran’s oil revenues but gives the US president powers to waive penalties as required. Senior US officials said Washington was engaging with its foreign partners to ensure the sanctions can work without harming global energy markets, and stressed the US strategy for engaging with Iran was unchanged by the bill.

The bill may also prove problematic for Pakistan in ways other than providing assurances of concrete steps to counter the manufacture of IEDs. The sanctions placed on dealing with Iran’s central banks may weigh on Pakistan’s plans for the Iran-Pakistan pipeline which aims to provide gas to Pakistan.

Pakistan needs the gas supplies from Iran to augment its own gas reserves which have been shrinking fast, leading to widespread gas shortages affecting its industry and daily life.