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Pakistan anger at US terror link claim
Source: Agencies |
September 24, 2011, Saturday
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PAKISTAN lashed out at the United States for accusing the country's most powerful intelligence agency of supporting extremist attacks against American troops in Afghanistan - the most serious allegations against Islamabad since the beginning of the Afghan war.
Pakistani Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar dismissed the claims as mere allegations. She warned the US that it risked losing Pakistan as an ally and could not afford to alienate the Pakistani government or its people.
"If they are choosing to do so, it will be at their own cost," Khar told Geo TV on Thursday from New York City, where she is attending a United Nations General Assembly meeting. "Anything said about an ally, about a partner publicly to recriminate it, to humiliate it, is not acceptable."
Khar's comments were first aired in Pakistan yesterday.
Pakistani Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani said Washington was in a tough spot.
"They can't live with us. They can't live without us," Gilani told reporters yesterday in the southern city of Karachi. "So, I would say to them that if they can't live without us, they should increase contacts with us to remove misunderstandings."
The Pakistani officials were responding to congressional testimony by the top US military officer about Pakistan.
Admiral Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, accused Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence agency on Thursday of supporting the Haqqani insurgent network in planning and executing the assault on the US Embassy in Afghanistan last week and a truck bomb that wounded 77 American soldiers days earlier.
He also said the US had information that Haqqani extremists, with ISI help, were responsible for the June 28 attack on the Inter-Continental Hotel in Kabul and other assaults.
The Haqqani insurgent network is widely believed to be based in Pakistan's North Waziristan tribal area along the Afghan border. The US has said the Haqqani network, which has ties to both al-Qaida and the Taliban, poses the greatest threat to American troops in Afghanistan.
Mullen insisted that the Haqqani insurgent network "acts as a veritable arm" of the ISI, undermining the uneasy US-Pakistan relationship forged in the terror fight and endangering American troops in the almost 10-year-old war in Afghanistan.
Pakistan is "exporting violence" and threatening any success in Afghanistan, Mullen told the Senate Armed Services Committee.
"In choosing to use violent extremism as an instrument of policy, the government of Pakistan, and most especially the Pakistani army and ISI, jeopardizes not only the prospect of our strategic partnership but Pakistan's opportunity to be a respected nation with legitimate regional influence," Mullen said.
Pakistan has denied ties to the group in the past and has said it cannot attack them because its troops are stretched fighting other militants.
Mullen reaffirmed his support for continued US engagement with the nuclear-armed Pakistan.
Pakistani Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar dismissed the claims as mere allegations. She warned the US that it risked losing Pakistan as an ally and could not afford to alienate the Pakistani government or its people.
"If they are choosing to do so, it will be at their own cost," Khar told Geo TV on Thursday from New York City, where she is attending a United Nations General Assembly meeting. "Anything said about an ally, about a partner publicly to recriminate it, to humiliate it, is not acceptable."
Khar's comments were first aired in Pakistan yesterday.
Pakistani Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani said Washington was in a tough spot.
"They can't live with us. They can't live without us," Gilani told reporters yesterday in the southern city of Karachi. "So, I would say to them that if they can't live without us, they should increase contacts with us to remove misunderstandings."
The Pakistani officials were responding to congressional testimony by the top US military officer about Pakistan.
Admiral Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, accused Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence agency on Thursday of supporting the Haqqani insurgent network in planning and executing the assault on the US Embassy in Afghanistan last week and a truck bomb that wounded 77 American soldiers days earlier.
He also said the US had information that Haqqani extremists, with ISI help, were responsible for the June 28 attack on the Inter-Continental Hotel in Kabul and other assaults.
The Haqqani insurgent network is widely believed to be based in Pakistan's North Waziristan tribal area along the Afghan border. The US has said the Haqqani network, which has ties to both al-Qaida and the Taliban, poses the greatest threat to American troops in Afghanistan.
Mullen insisted that the Haqqani insurgent network "acts as a veritable arm" of the ISI, undermining the uneasy US-Pakistan relationship forged in the terror fight and endangering American troops in the almost 10-year-old war in Afghanistan.
Pakistan is "exporting violence" and threatening any success in Afghanistan, Mullen told the Senate Armed Services Committee.
"In choosing to use violent extremism as an instrument of policy, the government of Pakistan, and most especially the Pakistani army and ISI, jeopardizes not only the prospect of our strategic partnership but Pakistan's opportunity to be a respected nation with legitimate regional influence," Mullen said.
Pakistan has denied ties to the group in the past and has said it cannot attack them because its troops are stretched fighting other militants.
Mullen reaffirmed his support for continued US engagement with the nuclear-armed Pakistan.
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