LOS ANGELES: CIA director Leon Panetta said Monday US intelligence officials did not know the exact whereabouts of all Pakistan's nuclear weapons, but believed they were safe from the Taliban.Speaking in Los Angeles, the Central Intelligence Agency chief said Pakistan's nuclear arsenal was "pretty secure" amid concerns that the weapons could possibly fall into the hands of Taliban insurgents. "We don't have frankly the intelligence to know where they are all located, but we do track the Pakistanis," Panetta said when asked if the US knew where Pakistan's nuclear weapons were located."Right now we are confident that the Pakistanis do have a pretty secure approach to trying to protect these weapons. But it is something that we continue to watch because obviously the last thing we want is for the Taliban to have access to nuclear weapons in Pakistan." Pakistan forces have been locked in an offensive with Taliban fighters in the country for several weeks. The fighting comes amid intense US pressure to crack down on militants in the northwest of the country, which Washington says pose the most serious terrorist threat to the West. Panetta was speaking at a luncheon hosted by the non-partisan Pacific Council on International Policy think tank in Los Angeles.
BEIRUT: Thousands of people converged Saturday on central Beirut to mark the fourth anniversary of the assassination of Lebanese former premier Rafiq Hariri.Waving Lebanese flags and carrying pictures of the slain leader, men, women and children gathered under sunny skies in Martyr's Square where members of the parliamentary majority were to address the crowd. The rally comes as final preparations are underway in The Hague for the launch of the international tribunal set up to bring Hariri's killers to justice. It also comes as the country prepares for legislative elections in June that will pit Western-backed political parties against a Hezbollah-led alliance backed by Syria and Iran.Hariri died in a massive car bombing on February 14, 2005 that also killed 22 others. The assassination was widely blamed on then Lebanese power-broker Syria, which has denied any involvement. The attack on the Beirut seafront was one of the worst acts of political violence to rock Lebanon since t...
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