Pakistan: No "prior information" of air strikes

(Updated at 12:29 p.m. ET with further comments from Pakistani official claiming U.S. notification of the strike arrived too late.)

Pakistan has rejected claims by unnamed U.S. officials who told The Wall Street Journal that Pakistan's own military gave the go-ahead for air strikes which resulted in the deaths of 24 Pakistani soldiers.

"Pakistan did not have any prior information about any operation in the area," Pakistan's army said in a statement to CBS News. "In fact, wrong information about area of operation was provided to Pakistani officials few minutes before the strike."

The remote outposts, which sit perched atop a mountain overlooking the border with Afghanistan, "were clearly marked on maps. These locations were shared with ISAF and our own troops were well aware of their presence," a Pakistani Foreign Ministry official told CBS News' Farhan Bokhari on Friday, separate from the army's reaction.

The vehement denial came just hours after The Wall Street Journal published an article claiming precisely the contrary.

"There is no question of a mistake in failing to know of their presence," the Foreign Ministry official told CBS News. "These were sizeable posts which were in regular contact with command centers."

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The Pakistani army statement goes on to claim U.S. officials at a joint border coordination center, "later apologized privately to Pakistan officials for initially providing wrong information, and subsequent engagement of post without prior information / clearance."

Another Pakistani military official, speaking to the Associated Press on condition of anonymity, said the Americans had, in fact, given their Pakistani counterparts the location for the planned strike, but he said the information arrived late and the coordinates were incorrect.

He also said Pakistan never gave the go-ahead for the strike.

"Wrong information about (the) area of operation was provided to Pakistani officials a few minutes before the strike," he said. "Without getting clearance from Pakistan side, the post had already been engaged by U.S. helicopters and fighter jets."

Friday's volley of accusations between officials in Islamabad and the U.S. is merely the newest rung on a ladder of mistrust which seems to be climbing ever skyward.

What is certain is that U.S. helicopters attacked the two outposts in the early morning hours on Saturday and killed the 24 Pakistani soldiers.

After that fact, the details of what prompted the attack and what warnings were given differ sharply from the two sides.

According to the U.S. officials who spoke to the Journal for Friday's article, "When called, the Pakistani representatives at the center said there were no Pakistani military forces in the area identified by the commandos, clearing the way for the Americans to conduct the airstrikes."

One official seemed almost to temper the claim by telling the Journal that "lots of mistakes" had been made on both sides. "There was not good situational awareness to who was where and who was doing what."

As the Journal's article points out, that may be, in part, because U.S. mistrust of Pakistan's military and intelligence forces leads to some operations being kept secret - a prime and inflammatory example being the May 2 raid in the city of Abbottabad in which U.S. Navy SEALs killed Osama bin Laden.

While the blame game is still gaining steam, even irate Pakistani officials have conceded that, in time, necessity will bring the two sides together again.

Pakistan relies on the U.S. government for billions in foreign aid money to keep paying its work force, and the U.S. is dependent on Pakistani cooperation if it ever hopes to quell the violence in neighboring Afghanistan and bring home American troops.