Karzai, Obama speak on fighting terrorism in Pakistan

U.S. President-elect Barack Obama pledged in a telephone conversation with Afghan President Hamid Karzai that fighting terrorism in Afghanistan and the region – an apparent reference to Pakistan – would be a top priority during his administration, Karzai’s office said Sunday.

The phone call between Obama and Karzai on Saturday is the first reported contact between the two leaders and comes more than two weeks after the Nov. 4 U.S. election. The United States has some 32,000 American forces in Afghanistan, a number that will be increased by thousands more next year.

Afghanistan has long pressed the U.S. to tackle what it calls the bases of terrorism in Pakistan, and Obama’s reported pledge will likely please Karzai, who has accused Pakistan’s intelligence service of supporting the Taliban in plotting bombings and other attacks in Afghanistan – claims that Pakistan, a key U.S. ally in its war on terror, flatly denies.

Obama in the past has expressed frustration with Pakistan’s efforts to go after militants in its territory. During the presidential campaign he said that, “If Pakistan cannot or will not act, we will take out high-level terrorist targets like bin Laden if we have them in our sights.”