The ISI continues to maintain links with Lashkar-e-Taiba, the terrorist outfit responsible for 26/11, and Islamabad is reluctant to take action against its leaders and its network, several eminent US scholars and experts of South Asia have categorically told US lawmakers.

The Pakistani intelligence agency ISI knows the whereabouts of Osama bin Laden but is keeping his location a secret and wants to use the al Qaida chief as leverage over the US.

The capture of the Afghan Taliban's No. 2 commander by a joint CIA and Pakistani team dealt a fresh blow to insurgents under heavy U.S. attack and raised hopes that Pakistani security forces are ready to deny Afghan militant leaders a safe haven.

The Taliban's top military commander has been arrested in a joint CIA-Pakistani operation in Pakistan in a major victory against the insurgents as US troops push into their heartland in southern Afghanistan, officials said on Tuesday.

United States along with other European countries are ignoring India's role in Afghanistan in their effort to appease Pakistan, a prominent American foreign policy magazine has said.