Agence France-Presse,
Kabul: The US-led coalition in Afghanistan said on Wednesday that four US helicopter engines worth more than 13 million dollars had gone missing while being transported by a Pakistani truck company.
“Four helicopter engines transported by a Pakistani truck company to Coalition Joint Task Force 101 went missing. The exact location is not determined yet”, coalition spokesman Christian Patterson told AFP.
The engines went missing before the 101st Airborne took command of the coalition in Afghanistan on April 11, Patterson said.
“They were being sent from Bagram to Fort Bragg, USA. The collective value of the engines is worth 13.2 million dollars,” he added.
The announcement came after a Pakistani newspaper reported that Taliban militants had filmed what it said were stolen parts from US helicopters including a Chinook and a Black Hawk.
The News, an English-language daily, said the Taliban had circulated CDs containing images of the engines, but did not publish any pictures.
International forces in landlocked Afghanistan must transport much of their military equipment overland via neighbouring Pakistan, which itself is a key ally in the US-led “war on terror”.
But relations have been strained as Washington and other Western allies put more pressure on Islamabad to crack down on Taliban militants allegedly based in Pakistan's tribal belt bordering Afghanistan.
Ties plummeted to their lowest ebb last week after Pakistan said that a US air strike had killed 11 Pakistani soldiers near the border.
Days later Afghan President Hamid Karzai said that Kabul would be justified in launching attacks on militants on Pakistani soil, provoking an angry response from Islamabad.
