US military equipment openly sold in Peshawar

Peshawar, Feb 7: US military equipment including Night-Vision Gear, high-power binoculars, boots and camouflage are openly being sold in Pakistan's border town, Peshawar, posing a risk of making the Taliban even more dangerous.

CBS News reported that US weapons on sale in Peshawar could improve Taliban capabilities and pose a great risk to NATO forces.

"This is state-of-the-art military equipment. If you're going to fight a war these days, you're much better off fighting at night. If you've got the equipment, sniper scopes and night-vision equipment, you can put the enemy off balance," said defense analyst Paul Beaver.

All this brand new equipment ends up there after Taliban attacks hit and loot NATO convoys, the channel said.

Around 80 percent supplies of NATO forces, including weapons, fuel and food, pass through the Khyber Pass between Pakistan and Afghanistan.

Recently, the Taliban blew up the only bridge on Khyber Pass, leaving fuel tankers belonging to US Company Mondo International lined up by the side of the road.

The vice president of Mondo International, working for US department of Defense, said that the bridge route was so insecure, that it has now become imperative to find a new route.

"If you are the Taliban, you're probably contemplating the next strategic stranglehold. So as you look on the horizon, it's unlikely that threat will go away," said Kevin Curtis of Mondo International Logistics.

The best supply routes are situated in the north. Although Russia has agreed for the new route, they are also causing troubles, the paper added.

The US has an important air base in Kgyrzstan but the Russian pressure is forcing it to leave.

"The Russians can start to play power games with this, and this is exactly what I think we're seeing now," Beaver said.

ANI