from the NYTimes (website 19/11): "Several hundred Pakistani fighters are also believed to have sought refuge in Kunduz, including relatives of some powerful clerics, this intelligence official said. Saving them could improve President Musharraf'S strained relations with his country's hard-line religious parties, which have opposed his assistance to the United States.
Northern Alliance commanders and numerous refugees from Kunduz said in recent days that at least two airplanes landed at Kunduz airport, presumably to take away some of those who had retreated to the city. The commanders speculated that the planes were from Pakistani intelligence, but officials in Islamabad emphatically denied knowledge of the flights." Is there anyone in the world who imagines that airplanes could fly into and out of this besieged "terrorist" stronghold without the explicit and deliberate approval of the highest US command authorities? Shane Mage "Thunderbolt steers all things." Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr. 64