expecting they will only bite your neighbor”….
defensive……Mind your own business lady pakistan can handle this situation we do not
need any lectures from you…..
imaginative…..One thing seems clear here is that a US-India block and a Pak-Russia block is in the making…..
pragmatic…..She is going to be the next President of the USA. Better pay heed now or the relationship will really go south….
Hilary is supposedly a friend of India. But that was in the good old, pre-Hindu-Brotherhood days. She is definitely a liberal imperialist, and probably takes the Carlotta Gall line on Pakistan (USA is fighting the wrong enemy etc.). At any rate, the reactions are predictable to say the least.
Given how America and her best friends and allies behave (and talk), it is probably a good idea for all parties to step back, reduce expectations and keep a friendly and respectful distance.
In that sense, the India-USA relationship is probably just at the right temperature, not too hot and not too cold. In the meantime there needs to be strengthening of people to people links. Start with small steps: encourage more direct flights between India and USA (why not?).
………
Former US secretary of state Hillary Clinton has said that
Pakistan’s policy of seeking strategic depth in Afghanistan has been
proven wrong and the country now needs to focus all its strength on
dealing with the militants.
“Their idea, that they have
these groups to provide strategic depth, as they like to say, vis-a-vis
Afghanistan, or vis-a-vis India, I think if that were ever true, which I
doubt, but if that were ever true, it no longer is,” she told Indian
NDTV channel.
….
In the interview that focused on her new book,
‘Hard Choices’, Ms Clinton said that Pakistan also needed to make a hard
choice now, disconnecting its ties to various terrorist groups and
putting together all state powers to “once and for all go after
extremists, shut down their training camps, their safe havens, (and)
madressahs that are inculcating suicide bombing behaviour.”
The Pakistanis must also “begin to have a different view of themselves in the future”, she added.
Ms
Clinton said she believed the Asif Zardari government did not know what
the connections were between elements within the military and the ISI
and various extremist and even terrorist groups.
…
She also said
that those were under the mistaken view that having these kinds of
proxies vis-a-vis India, vis-a-vis Afghanistan were in Pakistan’s
interests.
“It’s like keeping poisonous snakes in your backyard
expecting they will only bite your neighbour and what we are seeing now
is the continuing threat to the state of Pakistan by these very same
elements.”
….
Ms Clinton said that when she visited India after the
Mumbai terror attacks, she was “very struck” by how the then government
said it was very difficult to exercise restraint. “I don’t think any
government could say anything differently.”
…
She said when Sonia
Gandhi and former Indian prime minister Manmohan Singh conveyed the news
of the Mumbai terror attacks to her, she told them: “This is an element
within the military intelligence institutional base, but that the
civilian government was not involved. But I think that no country can
turn away from that kind of attack continuously.”
….
She noted that
the terrorists now had moved deeper inside Pakistan, attacking targets
in major Pakistani cities. “We’ve just seen the attacks in Karachi. And I
don’t see how Pakistan can ignore this much longer.”
Asked who
she thought was accountable for the terror attacks, she said: “We
certainly never had any evidence that it went to the very top, but that
may or may not be true.”
……..
Link: http://www.dawn.com/news/1114535/pakistan-needs-to-make-hard-choices-now-hillary
……
regards