Edition: U.S. / Global

A NATION CHALLENGED: THE PURSUIT; Tribal Leaders in Pakistan Warn the U.S. to Keep Out

Published: March 25, 2002

Tribal leaders from the treacherous mountainous areas along the border with Afghanistan have an unambiguous message for American commanders who have suggested that they might enter the region in pursuit of Al Qaeda fighters: Don't.

One tribal leader, wagging his finger for emphasis, said that tribal elders saw America as the enemy and that his people would sacrifice their lives to keep American soldiers off their land.

A more moderate leader, a well-educated man, said more calmly that no foreigner may go into the tribal areas without permission. That warning must be taken seriously; ages ago, Alexander the Great was turned back, and for the last 53 years, until December, no soldiers, not even Pakistanis, were allowed in.

In separate interviews, the tribal leaders, Pashtun Muslims, expressed other views the Bush administration would certainly find discouraging: that the core of American policy is a hatred of Muslims and that Osama bin Laden was not responsible for the Sept. 11 attacks.

Such sentiments portend great turbulence for Washington and for Pakistan's leader, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, who has cast his lot with the United States and the war on terrorism.

The war in Aghanistan will drag on for a long time if the tribal areas, which share a porous 450-mile border with Afghanistan, become a safe haven for Taliban and Al Qaeda fighters to rest and regroup. This is exactly what American officials believe the fighters are doing, with some reason, because men from those regions poured into Afghanistan to fight early in the war.

Last week a senior American commander in Afghanistan, Maj. Gen. Franklin L. Hagenbeck, raised the possibility that American forces might cross into Pakistan in ''hot pursuit'' of fleeing Al Qaeda and Taliban fighters.

American officials have raised the possibility of such an operation with General Musharraf, and when General Hagenbeck's remarks were reported here, there was no denial or reaction by the government, a tacit message of assent.

But the dangers lurk. Politically, General Musharraf, who faces vocal and violent opposition to his alliance with Washington, cannot afford unrest in the tribal areas, Pakistani political observers say.

The Federally Administered Tribal Area consists of seven defined tribal agencies, home to some five million people, in northwest Pakistan. The agencies have their own councils, courts and law, and the rule of the leaders is absolute. On Friday, an elder who dissented from the ruling of the grand council of the Orakzai tribe had his house burned down as punishment.

It was only after intense negotiations and promises of substantial amounts of development money (and other money that is not publicly discussed) that the tribal councils even allowed the Pakistani Army to enter the region, in December. Pakistan now has 12,000 troops patrolling the border, concentrated on a 50-mile stretch of mountains overlooking a region of Afghanistan where American troops have been engaged in some of the fiercest fighting.

''We have completely sealed off the border,'' said an army spokesman, Maj. Amir Uppal. There is ''no possibility'' that Al Qaeda soldiers are hiding in the area, he said in an interview.

Few take that claim seriously. While it is easy to patrol the major road crossings (there are only a handful), the mountains hide thousands of trails, worn by men, women, families and donkeys over centuries. A Western diplomat in Islamabad noted that the United States, with all its trained law enforcement officials, ditches, canals, fences and sophisticated sensors, could not seal the relatively level border with Mexico.

The border may be harder to cross now than four months ago, but it is by no means impossible.

Ibrahim Khan, 19, said he crossed on Friday. Standing beside mud huts in a refugee camp where horses pulled wooden carts loaded with firewood, he said that at one point he and two friends were spotted by Pakistani soldiers, who fired on them with machine guns. They found easy cover in the mountains and, when it was safe, they finished their journey.

Another man, in the central market here, said he and his family had been able to cross after paying Pakistani soldiers. Before he could continue, a man selling shoes and T-shirts told him he should not speak about such things. Other refugees fleeing Afghanistan have said that the going rate is $200 a family.

Men have been crossing the border to fight in Afghanistan for years. When the United States began bombing the Taliban, men from the tribal areas again went over to fight.

''Unfortunately, we did not have the means and resources to fight such a large and sophisticated army like the Americans,'' said Shakirullah Jan Kokikhel, a chief of the 100,000-member Kokikhel tribe.

Tribal people are famously proud, tough and self-confident, and Mr. Shakirullah, 69, with a grizzled beard, is all of those. He is no political neophyte. For 20 years, he fought for adult suffrage in the tribal areas, where until 1997 only the tribal chiefs could vote, and on Saturday he was headed to Islamabad to march in a demonstration against General Musharraf.

''Listen to me,'' he said, pointing his finger and switching from Pashtu to English. ''There was a time, when Russia was in power, we liked Americans.'' Indeed, when the Soviet Union occupied Afghanistan, men from the tribal areas joined the guerrilla army that was backed by the United States. ''Now we hate Americans. Under our tribal rules, we designate an enemy. America is now the enemy.''

Under tribal rules, once the elders have spoken, everyone falls in line.

His views, however harsh, are widely held in Pakistan and throughout Muslim Asia and Southeast Asia.

''We don't hate individual Americans, like yourself,'' he went on. The problem is the policy of the American government. ''It is against Muslims,'' he said several times, categorically.

As proof, Mr. Shakirullah cited East Timor, where the United States backed a referendum on independence ''because they are Christians.'' The United States does not demand the same in Kashmir, he said, because they are Muslims.

Mr. Shakirullah insisted that there were no Taliban or Al Qaeda forces in his area. But what would happen, he was asked, if the American forces, not believing that, entered the area?

''There is already hatred of Americans among our elders,'' he answered, ''among our women and children, but then that hatred will reach its peak, and then we will fight them.''

What about the attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon? Was Mr. bin Laden responsible? ''Our research has shown that the Jews did it,'' he said, without any doubt.

In a far milder way, Ajmal Khan agreed with Mr. Shakirullah. A leader of the Maddakhel tribe, Mr. Ajmal, 50, was in Peshawar to meet with the provincial governor, a meeting that shows he is far more amenable to the government.

Like Mr. Shakirullah, Mr. Ajmal, dressed in an immaculate white, loose fitting waistcoat and trousers and a large turban, said there were no Al Qaeda or Taliban fighters in his area. If the Americans had evidence to the contrary, they should share it with him, and he and the elders would round them up.

Asked who was responsible for the World Trade Center attacks, Mr. Ajmal, a university graduate, former military officer and former minister of sport, grew uneasy. ''It must be the Jews,'' he said.

He said he knew that President Bush had convinced General Musharraf that Mr. bin Laden was responsible for the attacks, but ''he didn't convince me.''

Map of Pakistan highlighting the location of the tribal areas: Pakistan's forbidding tribal areas have been forbidden lands too.