US rules out hot pursuit of militants who flee to Pakistan

The US forces in Afghanistan have no plans to cross the international border to take out the Taliban and other militants who flee to Pakistan after conducting attacks inside the war-torn country, according to a top Pentagon official.

Afghanistan has witnessed some of the worst terrorist attacks killing scores of people. It has blamed Pakistan-based terror groups such as the Haqqani Network and the Afghan Taliban for these attacks.

"To be clear, US military authorities are within the borders of Afghanistan only. We have no authority to go into Pakistan. If there is a way to get that authority, but that would certainly be the exception and not the norm and would not be," Lt Col Mike Andrews, a spokesperson of the Department of Defence, said yesterday after his return from Afghanistan where he accompanied US Defense Secretary Jim Mattis.

"Say, for example, we have troops in contact and then the Taliban militants go across the border. They are clearly inside Pakistan then. There's no change with regards to respecting the territorial sovereignty of Pakistan."