Officials from Pakistan's pro-Taliban Islamic groups and Baluchistan's provincial government say madrassahs along the Afghan-Pakistan frontier only provide religious education.
"I challenge the US and Afghan governments to point out a single madrassah where we are imparting military training or where we have provided sanctuary to the Taliban," said Maulvi Noor Mohammad, a member of Pakistan's National Assembly.
He is head of the Quetta branch of the pro-Taliban Jamiat-e-Ulema-e-Islam, or "Party of Islamic Clerics."
"Thousands of Afghan refugees live here and we give only Islamic teachings to their children," he told reporters in his madrassah in Quetta, as hundreds of turbaned students memorized Koranic verses outside his room.
"But we don't give any military training to our students."
RSS