(RTTNews) - Pakistan and the United States have agreed to work together to counter the threat posed by the Haqqani Network of terrorists.
This was the outcome of a meeting between U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and her Pakistani counterpart Hina Rabbani Khar in New York on Sunday.
Khar is in new York to attend the United Nations General Assembly session, scheduled to begin on Tuesday. She is leading the Pak delegation as Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani canceled the US trip to focus on flood relief efforts in the country. At a special briefing, senior State Department officials said Clinton sent a clear message in the wake of the September 13 attack on the U.S. embassy and the headquarters of NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghan capital Kabul, "this was an issue that we had to deal with and that this is a threat to both Pakistan and the United States."
Khar told Clinton that "this kind of terrorism was a threat to Pakistan and to Pakistanis as well," considering the fact that since 2003, almost 19,000 Pakistanis have been killed in terrorist attacks.
Both Ministers committed themselves to working together on this as a matter of priority.
Responding to a question if Clinton sought specific commitments from the Pakistani Foreign Minister to take action on the Haqqani Network, a State Department official replied in the positive.
The two sides also discussed about the continuing threat from the Lashkar-e-Toiba, and TTP on Pakistanis, and about the safe havens and facilitators in Pakistan that allow Taliban to attack inside of Afghanistan.
Khar said that in Pakistan, Pakistanis don't believe that the United States was doing anything good for them, while the U.S. side said in return that "we recognize that there's some work to do on America's image in Pakistan."
State Department officials said "you can count on the United States to respond positively to the United Nations' request for more assistance" to Pak flood victims.
The two sides also discussed about Afghan-led and Afghan-owned reconciliation, and the regional aspects of bringing peace to Afghanistan. They reviewed the upcoming meetings in Istanbul on November 2 and in Bonn on December 5 and the role that the United States was trying to play to support Turkey and Afghanistan in the first instance and then Germany and Afghanistan in the second, and the role that Pakistan was interested and could play to support that regional effort as well.
There was a general agreement that a secure, stable, and prosperous Afghanistan will exist only inside a secure, stable, and prosperous region.
Clinton talked about the idea of the New Silk Road, the vision of an economic space between Central Asia and India, and Bangladesh. Khar raised economic issues of great importance to Pakistan, like market access and the reconstruction opportunity zones, the U.S. officials told reporters.
This was the outcome of a meeting between U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and her Pakistani counterpart Hina Rabbani Khar in New York on Sunday.
Khar is in new York to attend the United Nations General Assembly session, scheduled to begin on Tuesday. She is leading the Pak delegation as Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani canceled the US trip to focus on flood relief efforts in the country. At a special briefing, senior State Department officials said Clinton sent a clear message in the wake of the September 13 attack on the U.S. embassy and the headquarters of NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghan capital Kabul, "this was an issue that we had to deal with and that this is a threat to both Pakistan and the United States."
Khar told Clinton that "this kind of terrorism was a threat to Pakistan and to Pakistanis as well," considering the fact that since 2003, almost 19,000 Pakistanis have been killed in terrorist attacks.
Both Ministers committed themselves to working together on this as a matter of priority.
Responding to a question if Clinton sought specific commitments from the Pakistani Foreign Minister to take action on the Haqqani Network, a State Department official replied in the positive.
The two sides also discussed about the continuing threat from the Lashkar-e-Toiba, and TTP on Pakistanis, and about the safe havens and facilitators in Pakistan that allow Taliban to attack inside of Afghanistan.
Khar said that in Pakistan, Pakistanis don't believe that the United States was doing anything good for them, while the U.S. side said in return that "we recognize that there's some work to do on America's image in Pakistan."
State Department officials said "you can count on the United States to respond positively to the United Nations' request for more assistance" to Pak flood victims.
The two sides also discussed about Afghan-led and Afghan-owned reconciliation, and the regional aspects of bringing peace to Afghanistan. They reviewed the upcoming meetings in Istanbul on November 2 and in Bonn on December 5 and the role that the United States was trying to play to support Turkey and Afghanistan in the first instance and then Germany and Afghanistan in the second, and the role that Pakistan was interested and could play to support that regional effort as well.
There was a general agreement that a secure, stable, and prosperous Afghanistan will exist only inside a secure, stable, and prosperous region.
Clinton talked about the idea of the New Silk Road, the vision of an economic space between Central Asia and India, and Bangladesh. Khar raised economic issues of great importance to Pakistan, like market access and the reconstruction opportunity zones, the U.S. officials told reporters.
No comments:
Post a Comment