Arguing that it shares cultural, linguistic and ethnic commonalities with Afghanistan, Pakistan has claimed that it has more stakes in the war-torn country than India.
"Obviously, their (India's) interests (in Afghanistan) cannot be the same as ours because we share a border," Pakistan foreign minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi told the popular Charlie Rose Show telecast on PBS news channel.
Isn't that exactly why India will have a far more neutral position in Afghanistan ?abhishek_sharma wrote:"Obviously, their (India's) interests (in Afghanistan) cannot be the same as ours because we share a border," Pakistan foreign minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi told the popular Charlie Rose Show telecast on PBS news channel.
Gerard, many thanx for the links. SSridhar, thank you for the patient and detailed reply. You guys have saved me couple of hours of internet research straightaway....SSridhar wrote: Just to clarify, there are essentially four ways to obtain military supplies and services from the US.......
I personally have no comment on this. I guess this has been discussed to death.Increased infiltration in Kashmir Indian troops on Saturday killed six militants trying to infiltrate Indian Kashmir from the Pakistan Kashmir side. This was the third incident this week; three infiltrators were killed in the first two. Also, four militants died in two encounters elsewhere in Kashmir; the Army says they belong to the LeT.
It isn't even proper spring and already Pakistan has started infiltrating - yet again - after a serious fall-off in incidents in 2009. Naturally the US will have nothing to say bar a few platitudes and pressure on the Indians not to retaliate. Since the US does nothing for India on the terrorism issue, we don't quite see the logic of India continuing to oblige the US by showing restraint.
Of course, this also gives the Indians an excuse not to do anything, because the simple reality is the Indians are scared out of their undies at the thought of actually taking action. As for the way the US treats India, seeing as the Indians go around with a big "Please Kick Me" sign attached to their butts, you can't blame the Americans. Patriotic Indians should oblige their government and also join in the Kicking.
The latest blowup between the two emerging allies is the US's great reluctance to even allow Indian officers to interrogate the convicted terrorist David Headly - he is a Pakistani originally, but changed his name to a Christian one to escape attention. He's one of the key people behind the Bombay 2008 attacks. Mr. Headly, we are told, began to sing entire operas after US agents told him his next stop was going to be India if he didn't cooperate. In return, the US has told him he will not be extradited to India. Aside from the months of torture that awaited Mr. Headly, at the end he also faced the 100% probability of an early morning date with the hangman.
Excuse us, please, this is how the US cooperates with others on the GWOT? How many Americans versus Indians have died thanks to Mr. Headly? 1 as to 200?
Again, we are not going to upbraid the US. If the Indians are so pathetic that they cannot force the US to hand over the man, then they deserve every bit of disrespect they get from the Americans.
'Pak's sound strategy prevented Indian strike after 26/11'
March 27, 2010 21:13 IST
Pakistan's sound strategy to ward off threats like a possible surgical strike by India had barred the "adversary" from opting for any "extreme option" in the wake of the Mumbai attacks, Pakistan's air force chief said on Saturday.
Asked during a news briefing about India's reported plans of carrying out surgical strikes in the wake of the 2008 Mumbai incident, Air Chief Marshal Rao Qamar Suleman said the Pakistan Air Force had "immediately developed a strategy to counter the threat, which barred the adversary (from opting) for any extreme option".
"Our response time during such situations is from two to six minutes from the ground," he told the briefing held at the air headquarters here.
The "adversary did not dare to take any step" since it knew the capability of the PAF, he said.
The PAF is keeping a "watchful eye to safeguard the frontiers of the country" and effective systems are in place to cope with any situation, Suleman said.
Anujan wrote:All news about the Headley's admission is sourced from a single source: Outlook's editor.
Are there independent confirmation of this? (Not that I doubt Paki army's involvement, I want to see independent confirmation of Headley's admission)
Rangudu wrote: TOI, IE and Hindustan Times have all reported about FBI sharing the names of TSPA officers as revealed by Headley well before this Outlook article.
may be i'm missing some thing here. Why Anujan? It would be nice to have independent sources but meanwhile, i dont know why that should be doubted.sanjaykumar wrote:All news about the Headley's admission is sourced from a single source: Outlook's editor.
Good enough point. You mean the proximate source are the Indian news media. GOI has been sitting on this information for a while, it would not autonomously reveal it now as that would embarrass the US.
Popular kite festival shot down in Pakistan
Nicolas Brulliard, Washington Post
Sunday, March 28, 2010
…………………. Sajjad Bhutta, a top Lahore district officer, has said Basant involves immoral drinking and parties that cannot be tolerated in a Muslim society. He declined to elaborate on those views in an interview.
Muhammad Raghib Naeemi, head of one of Lahore's largest religious schools, cited many reasons to drop kite-flying, including its ties to Hindu culture and its origins allegedly linked to a man accused of committing blasphemy against the prophet Muhammad. The perils of the festival and the depravity associated with it only strengthen the need for the prohibition, he said. ………………………
San Francisco Chronicle
Lets me see now
. Alternatively, the Military of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan are a cowardly and impotent bunch who cannot protect their own sovereignty 
.And who will fund this dam?vishal wrote:Pakistan planning $12 billion dam on Indus
...or even brave mujahids of the Pakistan army throwing rocks at drones from hilltops to bring them down like they used to do in the good old daysarun wrote: There is not one single instance of a Bakhtar Shikan launched droneward, not one single instance of a Cobra Helicopter gunship attempting to shoot down a drone nor a single instance of an F-16 scrambled to shoot down a drone.
shaardula-jishaardula wrote:may be i'm missing some thing here. Why Anujan? It would be nice to have independent sources but meanwhile, i dont know why that should be doubted.
The plea names a retired Pakistani military officer, Col. Abdur Rehman Hashim Syed, known as Pasha, as Mr. Headley’s main contact.
My take is that while many in the Indian establishment want to pursue DH and do what it takes, it is MMS who may be ambivalent. Recall, as you point out, the fact that DH revealed LeT's ties to TSPA was known for months, and yet MMS announced aman ki aasha, walking the extra mile etc. Thus, if the DH revelations continue to hit the headlines, what does it do to US strategy of facilitating their clients TSP and MMS to make love? This could be one of the reasons why US is putting DH on cold storage, with the sure bet that it will fizzle away in a few months. In the meantime, they calibrate some token moves by TSP to give MMS some political cover to walk the extra mile.Rangudu wrote:TOI, IE and Hindustan Times have all reported about FBI sharing the names of TSPA officers as revealed by Headley well before this Outlook article.Anujan wrote:All news about the Headley's admission is sourced from a single source: Outlook's editor.
Are there independent confirmation of this? (Not that I doubt Paki army's involvement, I want to see independent confirmation of Headley's admission)
Thanks to Unkil's perfidy, Headley's testimony and statement made during the plea deal etc. are all sealed, so we only have off the record stuff to go by.
FYI, the main TSPA officer in this whole deal is a man who goes by Sajid Mir a.k.a Abu Al Qama a.k.a Zarar Shah a.k.a Colonel Syed a.k.a Coloner Saeed. No one knows is real name for sure.
He's the key link between LeT and TSPA, i.e. he reports to Hafiz Saeed and also to TSPA and the other Majors likely reported to him.
I got all of the above from many sources over several years, including direct contact with a couple of the foremost Western experts on LeT, but no one tries to get to the bottom of this.
SSridhar wrote:Nawaz & Miliband discuss Constitutional Reforms DeadlockBritish Foreign Secretary David Miliband called PML-N chief Nawaz Sharif over the telephone on Saturday to discuss the constitutional reforms package, according to a private TV channel. Talking to another channel, Punjab government spokesman Senator Pervaiz Rashid confirmed that Nawaz and Miliband discussed the deadlock over the constitutional reforms. “They talked about the deadlock over the constitutional reforms,” said Rashid. The British secretary hoped that the PML-N would play its role in ending the deadlock over the reforms. The channel said Britain was a guarantor of the Charter of Democracy, which was signed between the Pakistan People’s Party and the PML-N in London. {Didn't realize that. The interference in internal political dynamic is complete. The US forced Musharraf to talk to Benazir. KSA was a guarantor for the exile of Nawaz and it also forced him to return to Pakistan. When he was refused entry to Pakistan on the tarmac of Lahore airport, the KSA ambassador was involved in negotiations. Later it sent emissaries who asked him to behave in 2007. Really a banana country, this Pakistan. One more reason why it should be divested of nuclear weapons.}
Repeating my thought -archan wrote:As the above ^^ link displayes yet again, the pakis have sold their country, their souls and have not won an inch of Kashmir, or even concessions on water, for that matter. We should perhaps keep this reality in mind when declaring "pakis have won!" from our rooftops.
thanks. nicely mapped.Anujan wrote: OTOH, independent verification of Headley's admission (rather than sourced from a single source who might have his own sources within the Ministry etc) indicates that India or the US is going to town with the admission. This has two implications.
1. If India is going to town with the admissions, it is doing the pre-dance of actually taking a stand regarding interrogation/access to Headley, with possible measures if it is confirmed by Headley that serving Paki army officers are involved
2. If US is going to town with the admissions, it is indicative of a change of tact (of them doing the right thing) and possible pressure on Paki army to take action against these officers.
If the news has been sourced from a single source, who is unwilling to reveal his sources (which means it is either a unofficial leak or a speculation), the news is just going to fizzle out and die. It will be taken in the spirit of "yeah yeah, we all know Paki army is involved, so whats new".
That is exactly 100% correct. One of the ruling party mouthpieces, Bakara, in her commentary made this same point, namely, while Indian govt knows TSP ISI is up to terror tactcis, Indian govt should not harp on it because then public pressure to not make love will kick in. But if the US is willing to indict TSPA/ISI, they (ruling establishment) will lap it up for free for what ist worth. But US is playing a double game and sees no value in implicating its renier boy for crimes against India.asprinzl wrote:Could it be possible that the ruling coterrie do not want info on full scale Paki state involvement exposed to the public because in such a case the GoI will have to act or they would look like idiots but the country itself is ill prepared to carry out any action against the satan state due to the massive long term neglect of the armed forces especially the air power? Just asking.
I think it is obvious that the state is unprepared to take the action to defeat the Pakistani state comprehensively and give a 100% guarantee of a conclusion suitable to India. That sort of comprehensive action is not on. We know that the Indian state is weak enough to release terrorists in exchange for Indians rather than sacrifice the people and hit the terrorists. But everyone knows that.asprinzl wrote:Could it be possible that the ruling coterrie do not want info on full scale Paki state involvement exposed to the public because in such a case the GoI will have to act or they would look like idiots but the country itself is ill prepared to carry out any action against the satan state due to the massive long term neglect of the armed forces especially the air power? Just asking.
No electricity or oil, no industry, no hospitals, no offices, no air-conditioners, no internet, no computers and of course no TV and no cars or motorcycles. If you cannot make it by hand, then it should not be made and if it is not alive, you cannot ride it. Ah, what tripe you say but I warn you, it all makes perfect sense. The only time when the Muslims were gloriously in charge of half the known world was when there was no electricity and before the internal combustion engine had been discovered. Also, there will be no cell phones or loudspeakers; not having these two will definitely be a blessing!More importantly, in those days of Muslim ascendancy the environment was doing just fine and there was no global warming either. So, if we put two and two together, it becomes clear that the discovery of electricity and all the ways it is generated and all the things it is used for are bad for the environment and most likely led to the downfall of all the Muslim Empires.Also, all the great Muslim scientists, mathematicians and scholars did their important work before electricity was discovered. Abu Ali Sina (Avicenna), Al Ghazali (Algazel), Ibn Rushd (Averroes), Ibn al-Haitham (Alhazen), Al Khwarizmi (Algorithm) to name a few all made their great discoveries and read and wrote hundreds of books without any electrical lamp around. So it is safe to say that scientific and philosophical thought among Muslims thrived because there was no electricity around.What about women under the Taliban you ask? Well, once the Taliban are in power, women will cease to exist by decree. No women, no women’s problems. What about children then? Clearly both the origin of pregnancy and the production of children are much too risqué and un-Islamic a subject to talk about. So, we will be quite willing to accept that children, especially the male ones, just happen.Another major advantage of ignoring the existence of women is that it will sharply drive up maternal and infant mortality. Destroying modern hospitals will also increase overall mortality, thus putting a stop to the scourge of population increase that is threatening the very existence of Pakistan.Pakistan will then have a barter economy where services are exchanged for goods like food and clothing. Moreover, like the early Muslim society during the times of the righteous caliphs, all citizens will be paid an allowance from the national treasury (Baitul Maal) so that they can subsist. As far as national ‘income’ is concerned, we will first auction all our ‘nukes’ in the open market and has anybody ever heard of selling carbon units?
arun wrote:The visceral hatred for their historical Hindu heritage boils over in the Islamic Republic of Pakistan and kite flying during the Basant festival is banned under the pretext of public safety posed by unsafe kite strings:
Popular kite festival shot down in Pakistan
Nicolas Brulliard, Washington Post
Sunday, March 28, 2010
Muhammad Raghib Naeemi, head of one of Lahore's largest religious schools, cited many reasons to drop kite-flying, including its ties to Hindu culture and its origins allegedly linked to a man accused of committing blasphemy against the prophet Muhammad. The perils of the festival and the depravity associated with it only strengthen the need for the prohibition, he said. ………………………
San Francisco Chronicle
During his visit to Pakistan last November, Gen James Jones, Obama’s national security adviser, conveyed a blunt warning that if Pakistan did not move aggressively against the Afghan Taliban on its soil, Washington itself would take action on the Pakistani side of the international border.
At the same time, in a classical case of carrot-and-stick diplomacy, Washington told Islamabad that if it complied with US wishes and stepped up “counterterrorism action,” Pakistan would be offered an expanded strategic partnership. This offer was made in a letter from Obama to Zardari. As the New York Times reported then, Obama promised Pakistani leaders what one US official described as a partnership of “unlimited potential” in which Washington would consider any proposal Islamabad puts on the table.
As usually happens on such occasions, the talks last week in the fourth round of the strategic dialogue, the first at ministerial level, were long on rhetoric. Hillary Clinton spoke of a new stage in bilateral relationship and our foreign minister proclaimed triumphantly, “We have upgraded the dialogue.” Qureshi needs to be reminded that upgrading the dialogue was not the end. The test of success is what we achieved at the dialogue, and the foremost issue on which success in forging a strategic partnership should be measured is the progress we make in getting access to civilian nuclear technology.
It should be clear to everyone from the outcome of the talks in Washington that the Obama administration is not prepared to seriously consider Pakistan’s demand for civilian nuclear cooperation, although it does not want to reject it outright publicly. At the joint press conference after her talks with Qureshi, Clinton said the US was prepared to listen to the Pakistani delegation on whatever issues it raises. But she carefully stopped short of saying that Washington would consider the Pakistani request.
Since then, an unnamed senior US official has made it clear that a civilian nuclear agreement with Pakistan is not on the table and that there are no plans for any formal talks on this issue. He noted that there was no reference to it in the joint statement issued after the talks. Kerry and Lugar, two leading US Senators, both of whom Qureshi met during his visit to Washington, have taken a position similar to that of the Obama administration. The reason, clearly, is that since Washington can buy Pakistan’s cooperation on Afghanistan quite cheaply and easily by giving increased economic and military assistance, it does not need to offer nuclear cooperation, a course that would put Washington’s newly forged strategic partnership with Delhi under great strain.
Some sections of the US media have openly voiced opposition. The Washington Post wrote in an editorial that a nuclear deal for Pakistan should be a non-starter for a host of reasons, including Pakistan’s failure to come clean about its involvement in the proliferation of nuclear weapons technology to Iran, Iraq and North Korea. The newspaper chose to ignore the steps which Pakistan has taken in the last five years to strengthen export controls in the country and which have been acknowledged internationally, including by US officials.
Among the US think tanks too, there are strong reservations over Pakistan’s request for peaceful nuclear technology. A major consideration is that it would upset India
Getting access to civilian nuclear technology will by no means be an easy task. There will be many hurdles we will have to cross: the reservations of the US administration, opposition in the Congress, the India lobby, the protagonists of non-proliferation and finally the NSG. India had the advantage of support from the nuclear industry which we will not have. We will therefore need a long and sustained effort. But we have not even started.
Pakistan is not without leverage in pursuing its demand for nuclear energy. Not only does Pakistan have a central role in the stabilisation of Afghanistan, our participation is needed in two key nuclear disarmament accords, the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) and the Fissile Material Treaty (FMT). The CTBT cannot enter into force without Pakistan’s ratification and Pakistan’s consent is needed to start negotiations on the FMT in the Conference on Disarmament. If Pakistan is not given access to peaceful nuclear technology, it will have very good reasons to refuse participation in both.
...
Our problem is not only US opposition to nuclear cooperation with Pakistan but equally the lack of commitment of our own national leadership. Musharraf was far too interested in retaining Washington’s support for his rule to raise a difficult bilateral issue. As William J Burns, then under secretary of state, said at a press conference, Musharraf conveyed to the US administration that he was “not unhappy” with the India-US nuclear deal.
...
Gilani should tell the US president and the other participating leaders that (a) unless Pakistan is given firm assurances of a waiver from NSG guidelines within a finite period, it would continue to oppose FMT negotiations in the CD; and (b) Pakistan would only sign or ratify the CTBT after India has done that, and after Pakistan gets access to civilian nuclear technology on the same terms as India. If Gilani does these things, he will not only compel the supplier countries to rethinks their duplicitous (munafiqana) nuclear policies towards Pakistan but also make his name in the country’s history.
The United States came to the Strategic Dialogue with a gun to its head. We are grateful to Washington for giving us a fair hearing. But can we force a change of mindset in Washington just because the US is facing a temporary setback in Afghanistan and needs Pakistan – again – to cut its losses?
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But our bargain is still not hard enough. For a nation that has suffered more than US $ 35 billion in losses and more than five thousand dead, one fifth of them due to US bombings in our tribal belt and others due to other regional intrigues, our position is still not fully recognized. There is an impression in the air that Washington is somehow doing a favor to Islamabad by holding a strategic dialogue.
Will the US;
• End its policy of encouraging the expansion in Indian military footprint in the region?
• End its policy of demonizing Pakistan in the media?
• End efforts to create pliant governments in Islamabad cultivate political proxies?
• End efforts to contain Pakistan’s military and intelligence infrastructure?
• End efforts to make Pakistan’s interests subservient to those of India’s in the region?
• End its policy of ignoring Kashmir?
• End its policy of not accepting Pakistan’s nuclear power status?
There is no hint on any one of these issues in the joint statement issued at the end of the talks. This is why the jubilant statements by our prime minister and the foreign minister after the first few rounds of the dialogue were premature. They reinforced the impression that the Pakistani government will be happy with crumbs. There was no mention of a free trade agreement or even a hint on a civil nuclear energy agreement. And yet our government took the exceptional step of moving the courts to reopen cases against Dr. A. Q. Khan, which appears like a lousy attempt at appeasement and is not a good precedent for the future.
...
The writer works for Geo TV. Email: aq@ ahmedquraishi.com
However, of the countless visits, only two, that of Prime Minister Liaquat Ali Khan in 1950 and of President Ayub Khan in 1961, stand out as state visits where the host, the US president, appeared honoured to greet the Pakistani visitors.
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During Liaquat’s visit, the first by a top Pakistani leader to the US, a new US-Pakistan relationship was constructed, which was a manifest need of that time. It was, in essence, a relationship of “reliance” on the US for defence.
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Liaquat Ali Khan made sure the defence-oriented relationship with the US did not betray the country’s honour. Pakistan continued to back the just Muslim causes in North Africa and Palestine so forcefully its advocacy of these became the dread of French, US and Israeli diplomats in the UN and other international forums. The admiration of the Arab world was shown by many new-borns in North Africa and the Middle East being named Zafarullah, after Pakistan’s foreign minister.
...
During the incumbent president’s US visit in May 2009 nothing was said on Kashmir
The second US visit of any consequence by a Pakistani head of state was that of President Ayub Khan. Forgetting for a while that Ayub Khan was the harbinger of martial law in the country and the resultant disasters, his US visit as president was a gain for the country in many ways, including his breakthrough with the Democrats, who traditionally have been more supportive of India. Getting the Democrats to also think of Pakistan’s standpoint and concerns was more than a useful outcome; it was reducing a prejudicial imbalance against Pakistan in the US Congress.
Liaquat Ali Khan was known to favour a policy of nonalignment, but was grappling with a model that would not result in Pakistan being overwhelmed in the “neutrals” camp by India. Pakistan would have accepted the role of a “senior” for India if it had conducted itself as one, but that was never to be, and Pakistan has always had to look for safeguards against the hostile intents of a bigger neighbour.
The country was not then entangled in alliances and pacts, and Liaquat Ali Khan impressively led his hosts to recognise that Pakistan could be a friend, not a contrivance, for US influence in South Asia.
The masterstroke was his visit to India in April 1950, a few weeks before his US trip, where Liaquat signed the famous Liaquat-Nehru Pact. This was widely covered in the US media and he came out looking very much a man of peace. When he arrived in the US, in May 1950, his reputation preceded him. For all purposes, Liaquat stole the show from Gandhian India as a peace-monger.
Liaquat’s visit was an experience for the Americans. President Truman was so taken in by his speeches, and their competent delivery
His was an all-Pakistani show. No foreign speechwriters, no foreign grooming and dress consultants, no foreign elocution instructors, who probably wept as their most recent charges from Pakistan spewed words that must have made parrots blush.
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Into this environment arrived Ayub Khan, with his striking personality and commanding presence, and his attractive daughter Nasim Aurangzeb in her captivating Pakistani outfits
One of the most successful official visits by a Pakistani was by Bashir, the camel-cart driver from Karachi. US vice president Lyndon Johnson, on a visit to Pakistan in May 1961, ran into Bashir when he stopped his motorcade on the street to chat with drivers of a row of passing camel-carts, and said to him in typical Texan drawl: “Yeah, now you come to see me in Texas, y’hear?” The reporters turned the routine Texan expression into an invitation from Johnson for Bashir. There was no getting away for Johnson.
Bashir arrived in the US in October 1961 and was an immediate hit. Johnson received him and apologised for the chill. Bashir’s response, “where there are friends like you there can be no chill, only warmth,” rocked America. From then on, the media hung on to every word Bashir uttered. All of America read and heard Bashir’s comments and loved him, and his country. Time magazine wrote that Bashir’s fluent homilies seem to come from the heart and “flow like the Rubaiyat.”
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Bashir’s comments touched hearts in America like no speech of a visiting Pakistani honcho ever did. Bashir’s US visit was undoubtedly one of most successful by anyone from Pakistan.
The writer is a former corporate executive. Email: husainsk@cyber. net.pk
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the government have developed differences over the proposed value added tax (VAT), raising fears not only of the fiscal deficit surging during the current and next year but also about the completion of a $11.3 billion standby arrangement programme.
According to sources, the IMF estimates that the VAT will increase the country’s revenue by 0.8 per cent of the GDP next year, but the finance ministry fears that the collection will drop by Rs35-45 billion because tax collection authorities are not fully prepared to take full benefit of the new measures.
Pakistan has so far drawn about $6.5 billion of the $11.3 billion standby programme which should be completed by December.
The sources said that besides the fact that the taxpayers not been sufficiently educated about the new tax and its benefits, the tax collection authorities were not fully geared to meet the challenge because of their lack of understanding of the new measures and an ongoing tug of war among various occupational groups of the taxation set-up after the creation of a new revenue service.
They said a trust deficit between Pakistan and the IMF had widened over recent days, leading the government to reconsider the proposal to increase electricity tariff by over six per cent in April as agreed with multilateral creditors.
The IMF has also delayed approval of its next $1.2 billion tranche of the programme which was scheduled to be released during the last week of the current month. A decision about increasing the power tariff has to be taken before March 31.
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The finance ministry had told the IMF that the authorities did not have enough time to disseminate information about VAT among taxpayers and that the reform programme could not be expected to yield desired results with a preparation of six months or a year, the sources said.
However, the IMF said the government had been working on the VAT mode since 1999.
The sources said the IMF believed that if the government was allowed a relaxation in introducing VAT this year, the move would become even more difficult next year because of political pressures as the next general elections would be nearer.
It was against this background that the IMF delayed the disbursement of the fifth tranche till a VAT legislation was introduced in all the provincial assemblies, they said.
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The sources said that if the government did not increase electricity tariff by six per cent, the deficit would exceed 5.5 per cent of the Gross Domestic Product by the end of the year.
The deficit target for the first half of the current financial year was missed by a wide margin mainly because of higher security expenditure and subsidies.
Answering a question about civilian nuclear technology, Mr Qureshi said insistence on some matters was not in the national interest.
But, Daily Times reports the same differentlyabhishek_sharma wrote:Qureshi terms talks with US ‘extremely successful’Answering a question about civilian nuclear technology, Mr Qureshi said insistence on some matters was not in the national interest.
However, as has happened since the 1950s, every visit to the US is triumphant indeed.To a question about whether he had also discussed the matter of a civil nuclear deal with the US, he said that discussing “some matters are against national dignity”.
Pakistan will soon hear “good news” about acquiring the US drone technology as significant progress was made on the issue . . . Pakistani political and military leaders had successfully pleaded the country’s case after doing extensive research regarding Islamabad’s national priorities, adding that the Americans did not present any new demands during
the talks.{Wow, that in itself is a great victory for the Faithful} . . . “On every matter, the US response was much better than we had anticipated,” . . . . Islamabad had requested easy-debt returning conditions for the country. . . . The foreign minister said that both the civilian and military leadership had presented Pakistan’s point of view with “one voice”. {Wow !! That's an achievement too. Such a unanimity was made possible by the decision of the civilian leadership to solidly throw its weight behind the military leadership in matters relating to foreign affairs.} . . . meeting between Chief of Army Staff General Ashfaq Pervez Kayani and an American think tank was “extremely successful”.
Touche, RamaY ji.RamaY wrote: Repeating my thought -
Well armed TSP is 3.5 Friends' Non-State Actor"
One cannot expect the WKK types to understand this. But what about GOI? Is it aware of this equation and is waiting for right moment (achieving the critical mass)?
But then we know the Indian state will sacrifice people to terrorists for the sake of walking the extra mile with Pakistan. We also know the Indian state will sacrifice people to riots rather than take preemptive action.shiv wrote:We know that the Indian state is weak enough to release terrorists in exchange for Indians rather than sacrifice the people and hit the terrorists.
Wonderfully put.Pranav wrote:TSP (or more precisely, the Pakjabi Sunni military-jihadist elites) are a non-state actor, wearing a suicide jacket supplied by the 3+ baaps.RamaY wrote: Repeating my thought -
Well armed TSP is 3.5 Friends' Non-State Actor"
Im apalled at the analogy being used to describe it. Hillary, mother of mother IndiaHillary Clinton would have exclaimed to her team at some stage how she wished the sub-continent was never partitioned. She must have felt like a mother of twins