News
Wednesday, May 18, 2011
Kerry confident of Pak efforts against terror
* US senator says ‘no indication’ high-level Pakistani officials had been complicit in hiding bin Laden
* Pakistanis hold the key to fastest Afghan drawdown
WASHINGTON: Pakistan, under renewed US pressure since the death of Osama bin Laden, is stepping up its efforts to battle terrorists and help stabilise Afghanistan, senior US Senator John Kerry said on Tuesday.
“Some of them are important things that are very important to us strategically, but they are not appropriate to discuss publicly,” said the Democratic lawmaker, who chairs the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
Kerry, newly returned from a whirlwind visit to both countries, said he had heard “frustration” from top Pakistani officials about the US raid that killed the al Qaeda leader, but had made clear Washington expects more from its ally.
“This relationship will not be measured by words or by communiques after meetings like the ones that I engaged in. It will only be measured by actions,” said the top US diplomat.
Kerry said Pakistani leaders had pledged new efforts to cooperate with Washington. “They are concrete, they are precise, they are measurable and they are in many cases joint – and we will know precisely what is happening with them in very, very short order,” he said.
“I’m very, very confident about a number of those things having a major impact on the things we need to do,” said Kerry, who promised to detail the new initiatives to his colleagues in a closed-door session expected next week.
Kerry said high-level US-Pakistan talks “that will begin very, very soon” would touch on “some larger issues”, and added that if they go well then US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton would decide “when and if” to visit Pakistan.
The US dignitary further said he had “no indication” during his trip to Islamabad that high-level Pakistani officials had been complicit in hiding bin Laden.
“They admit things went wrong, they understand that mistakes were made, and they’re going to try to get at it. I’m convinced that they want to find out because they want to hold those folks accountable,” said Kerry.
The senator said Pakistan’s role would affect US President Obama’s plans to start withdrawing US troops from Afghanistan in July and hand over security to Afghan forces in 2014, a deadline seen by some in Islamabad as Washington abandoning the region.
“We will pursue our policy in Afghanistan to the best of our ability no matter what,” Kerry said, but the Pakistanis “hold the key to the fastest, least costly, most effective” drawdown. afp
Courtesy www.dailytimes.com.pk