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Sunday, October 31, 2010
Obama’s India visit not at expense of Pakistan: US envoy* Holbrooke says US working with Pakistan, Afghanistan, India to promote peace in South Asia
WASHINGTON: “When President Obama goes to New Delhi, in what will be a very important trip to strengthen US-Indian ties, that is not at the expense of Pakistan or Afghanistan,” Richard Holbrooke said. The United States has good relations with Pakistan, Afghanistan and India and is working with the three countries living in “common strategic area” to promote peace and stability in South Asia, a senior American diplomat said ahead of President Barack Obama’s visit to New Delhi.
The US special representative for Pakistan and Afghanistan, said, “We want to be sure that everyone understands that when we pay attention to one country we’re not diminishing our support for the others.”
He added, “When President Obama goes to New Delhi, in what will be a very important trip to strengthen US-Indian ties, that is not at the expense of Pakistan or Afghanistan.
“We work with all three countries for peace and stability in South Asia,” stated the special envoy on return from Afghanistan.
“So you have a picture here of continuous engagement by the United States in these three countries, so different in culture and economic development and history, but living in a common strategic area, where actions in any one of the three affect the other two. The
United States has good bilateral relations with Kabul, Islamabad and New Delhi.”
With all three countries, Washington has good relations and wants to improve relations with all of them. “We fully take into account the effect of our actions on one on the other’s is the underlying principle with which our government approaches our policy,” he remarked.
Referring to US-Pakistan Strategic Dialogue, Holbrooke said, “We consider a very successful week with the Pakistani government last week.”
The diplomat said in two weeks he will be traveling to Islamabad for a very important Pakistan Development Forum meeting. “This is an extremely important event. It is the culmination of three prior conferences, two in New York and one last week in Brussels in regard to the floods and their aftermath. But it also a long-scheduled international effort to talk about long-term economic development in Pakistan. It will be run by the Pakistani government. And last week’s Strategic Dialogue with Pakistan, while it also was scheduled before the floods,” he said.
Holbrooke, who attended the signing ceremony of the transit trade agreement between Pakistani and Afghan ministers of commerce in Kabul on Thursday, hailed the development. “This is the most important agreement between Pakistan and Afghanistan since Pakistan’s independence. And it is more than a trade agreement; it is a political breakthrough as well, and it represents a move in the direction of one of the most critical goals that we have in that region, which is a closer relationship between Pakistan and Afghanistan, between Kabul and Islamabad. app
Courtesy www.dailytimes.com.pk