Via NYTimes.com -
Militants stepped up their fight against the Pakistani government in western Pakistan on Friday, the same day the American National Security Adviser, Gen. James L. Jones, met with top Pakistani officials in the capital.
The insurgents rammed a truck bomb into a regional office of the country’s main intelligence agency in Peshawar, sending a message that they were able to hit even the most sensitive official zones in Pakistan. The explosion, which left at least 11 people dead and more than 60 wounded, came just hours before General Jones began meetings with Pakistan’s president, Asif Ali Zardari, and its army chief, Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani.
General Jones briefed Mr. Zardari and other senior officials on the American strategy for Afghanistan, said a Pakistani official who spoke anonymously because of diplomatic protocol.
President Obama had “promised that Pakistan will be taken into confidence on Afghan strategy,” the official said, and that the visit on Friday “constituted that taking into confidence.”
There was no doubt about the target or the motive of the bombing on Friday: Pakistan’s intelligence agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence directorate, is a prominent symbol of military power, and militants have struck at it in different cities in Pakistan.
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