Taliban could ‘go in to India’ if not stopped: Qureshi

The Taliban could spread beyond Pakistan's border to India and as far as the Persian Gulf if they were not stopped,Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi has said seeking more foreign aid to combat the terrorists.

The Taliban could spread beyond Pakistan’s border to India and as far as the Persian Gulf if they were not stopped,Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi has said seeking more foreign aid to combat the terrorists.

“They (Islamic militants) have a global agenda,they have a regional agenda,they are not confined to Pakistan. They could go in to the (Persian) Gulf,they could go in to India,they can go anywhere,” Qureshi said.

“There is a collective interest and there has to be a collective realisation that this is not Pakistan’s problem (alone). It’s a larger problem,” he said.

He said Pakistan would need up to 2.5 billion dollars in emergency relief and for long-term reconstruction of the Swat valley and the surrounding region,once the fighting between Government troops and militants,now in its final stage,ends. Government officials had initially estimated a figure of one billion dollars in aid.

The warning comes as Pakistan widens its military offensive to other Taliban strongholds such as the Waziristan tribal region along the border with Afghanistan.