Originally Posted by aam bandha

Since you give credibility to HRW reports i will quote from them only ....
Read this report ..... but i will highlight some important parts

Crisis of Impunity - Pakistan's Support Of The Taliban

[FONT=Times New Roman]The subsequent shift to the Taliban also reflected changes in Pakistan's domestic politics. Newly elected in 1993, Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto sought to move away from Hikmatyar and the ISI and find new ways to open trade routes to Central Asia.92 Under pressure from the U.S. after a Pakistan-backed group kidnapped and murdered Western tourists in Indian-controlled Kashmir, the government also sought to put some political distance between itself and the war in Afghanistan.93[/FONT]
[FONT=Times New Roman]Support for the Taliban under Bhutto resided mainly in the interior ministry, according to some analysts. According to Ahmed Rashid, Bhutto's interior minister, Gen. Naseerullah Babar, created the Afghan Trade Development Cell in the ministry ostensibly to promote trade routes to Central Asia but also to provide the Taliban with funds. Moreover, says Rashid, the state-owned Pakistan Telecommunications Corporation set up a telephone network for the Taliban; the public works department repaired roads and provided electricity; the paramilitary Frontier Corps, a part of the interior ministry, set up a wireless network for Taliban commanders; the Civil Aviation Authority repaired Qandahar airport and Taliban fighter jets; and Radio Pakistan provided technical support to the Taliban's official radio service, Radio Shariat.94[/FONT]
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On several occasions between 1995 and 1999, the Taliban's military skills improved abruptly on the eve of particularly pivotal battles, and in one case, declined just as abruptly after a credible threat of intervention was made by an outside power. During its offensives in 1995 against Herat and in 1996 against Kabul, for example, the Taliban suffered heavy losses after mounting attacks against veteran government forces. Initial defeats were followed by a period of quiet; then Taliban troops mounted new attacks, displaying capabilities that had been conspicuously lacking before. At Herat in April 1995, a 6,000-man Taliban army was defeated by government troops after it ran short of ammunition and other logistical support; the rout was such that some analysts predicted that the Taliban phenomenon had run its course.107 Instead, after retraining and refitting, in August 1995 Taliban troops retreating in the face of an offensive by government troops suddenly counterattacked, ambushing the government's spearhead forces while mobile units mounted in 4x4 pickup trucks outflanked the government army and cut the roads connecting it with its rear-area supply depots. Retreating government units tried and failed to establish a defensive line as Taliban units in pickup trucks-many armed with antiaircraft cannon and rocket launchers-repeatedly outflanked the new positions and attacked from the rear, leaving the paved roads at will and driving their vehicles across open ground and rugged, hilly terrain. The pickup trucks, whose delivery was facilitated by Pakistan, introduced a kind of mobile warfare that had not been seen in the fighting before.108