WASHINGTON: The US military for the first time has provided Pakistan with a broad array of surveillance information collected by US drones flying along the border of Pakistan and Afghanistan, US military officials said yesterday. But it is not clear whether the cooperation will continue. US military drones flew a handful of noncombat surveillance missions along the border earlier this spring at the request of the Pakistani government, but requests for additional flights stopped abruptly without explanation, the officials were quoted as saying by the New York Times.

The offer to give Pakistan a much larger amount of imagery, including real-time video feeds and communications intercepts gleaned by remotely piloted aircraft, was intended to help defuse a growing dispute over how to use the drones and which country should control the secret missions flown in Pakistani airspace, US officials said.

In meetings last week with President Obama and other US officials in Washington, President Asif Ali Zardari of Pakistan repeated his insistence that his country be given its own armed Predator drones to attack operatives of Al Qaeda and the Taliban in Pakistan’s tribal areas along the Afghan border. But the US intelligence operatives who fly the armed drones inside Pakistan remain opposed to joint operations with Pakistani intelligence services, saying that past attempts were a failure. Several years ago, US officials gave Pakistan advance word of planned Predator attacks, but stopped the practice after the information was leaked to militants.

“We’re going after terrorists plotting directly against the United States and its interests,” said one US counter-terrorism official. “Nobody wants to gamble with those kinds of targets. We tried a joint approach before, and it didn’t work. Those are facts that can’t be ignored.”

US military officials said yesterday that there was no plan to allow the military to join the CIA in operating armed drones inside Pakistan. They disputed a report in The Los Angeles Times on Tuesday that said Pakistan had been given joint control of armed US military drones inside Pakistan. Obama administration officials are vigorously resisting sharing the drone technology with Pakistani security forces, but officials from both countries said compromises were possible.

US and some Pakistani officials spoke anonymously because the CIA drone operations are classified.

Pakistani officials said Zardari wanted the drone technology partly to tamp down anger inside Pakistan over the campaign of CIA air strikes inside the country, which have killed civilians in addition to more than a dozen Qaeda leaders. If Pakistan had its own Predators, they said, the government in Islamabad could make a more plausible case to the public that Pakistani missiles, not US missiles, were being used to kill militants.

Meanwhile the Los Angeles Times has reported that the U.S. military has flown drones into Pakistan at least a dozen times in recent weeks in cooperation with the Pakistanis as part of a new program, U.S. officials acknowledged Wednesday.

The military conducted test flights in March to demonstrate intelligence gathering capabilities to the Pakistanis. Those were followed by Pakistani requests for additional Predator flights to collect intelligence on suspected militants, said an official from U.S. Central Command, which oversees forces in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

The program’s existence was first reported Wednesday by The Times. Officials have told The Times that it represented an effort to have U.S. and Pakistani military officers work together on drones and to persuade Pakistan to fire the drones’ missiles at militant positions.

In response, the Central Command official and other military officers said Wednesday that a formal U.S. proposal for the joint effort did not include the use of armed strikes on suspected militant positions.

“This program is designed to provide an intelligence capability, not a weapons capability,” said the Central Command official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of Pakistani sensitivities about the program.

The government in Islamabad is ambivalent about the program, and strikes by the CIA’s separate fleet of unmanned aircraft have been deeply unpopular with the Pakistani public. The Pakistanis have not requested use of the drones since mid-April, the Central Command official said. The military’s Predator and Reaper drones are always armed with missiles.

Some of the flights over Pakistan involved drones that crossed over the border after armed missions in Afghanistan. Some U.S. military officials have expressed frustration at Islamabad’s reluctance to use the drones offensively. “This is an enhancement that will help you save your soldiers, your people,” one senior officer said he told the Pakistanis. “You will be more credible, you will be more effective.”-ONLINE

WASHINGTON: U.S. President Barack Obama allocated more war funds for Afghanistan than those earmarked for Iraq in a budget plan he unveiled. The president proposed 130 billion U.S. dollars in appropriation to support overseas military operations in fiscal year 2010 that begins Oct. 1, including 65 billion dollars for Afghanistan and 61 billion dollars for Iraq, according to his budget plan released by the White House.

It marks the first time that war spending for Afghanistan overtook those for Iraq and is in accordance with the new administration’s ongoing shift of war focus from Iraq to Afghanistan. Steve Stanley, the director of force structure, resources and assessment on the Joint Staff, told reporters at a Pentagon briefing that the budget request represents “where you’re going to first see the swing of not only dollars or resources, but combat capability” from Iraq to Afghanistan.

“The money requested here — about 65 billion dollars for Afghanistan — actually exceeds the 61 billion dollars that we’re requesting for Iraq,”So that’s the first time in our war costs request,” the official added.

Stanley explained that those numbers are based on keeping between 50,000 to 100,000 troops in Iraq and 68,000 in Afghanistan. In Iraq, U.S. troop levels are supposed to come down gradually over the next year, and these numbers are based on plans to bring troop levels down to around 50,000 by the end of the fiscal year 2010, which is Sept. 30 next year, according to the Pentagon.

Meanwhile, in Afghanistan, troop levels will grow to 68,000 later this year after all the additional troops Obama planned to send there are in position. In addition to pay for an increase of troops, war funds allocated for Afghanistan will pay for new equipment, like the scaled-down version of the Mine-Resistant Ambush Protected truck that will be customized for the primitive roads of Afghanistan.

However, Pentagon official cautioned that these figures are just projections based on certain assumptions about how the wars will progress in the year to come. Overall, the total war funding under the name of “Overseas Contingency Operations” budget plan represented a 10-percent decline from the war funding for this fiscal year, which is 145 billion dollars.

This budget plan also marks the first time that the war funding is included in the overall defense budget, a departure with the practices of the Bush administration, which paid for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan largely through emergency supplemental appropriations. That practice worried lawmakers and budget watchdogs, who argued that the practice limited oversight and encouraged profligate spending. NNI

WASHINGTON: Interviewed by a major American newspaper just before this week’s meeting between President Asif Ali Zardari and President Barack Obama, common people on the streets of Pakistan had a single message for the U.S. leader: stop drone attacks. Although many Pakistanis had welcomed the election of President Obama as an opportunity for some fresh thinking about their troubled region, The Los Angeles Times reported, the honeymoon hasn’t lasted long.

Pakistanis from different walks of life say they’d give the American leader an earful if they were at the White House table, correspondent Mark Magnier wrote from Islamabad. One of the biggest complaints: the deadly drones, the hugely unpopular unmanned aircraft involved in spying and firing on suspected “high value” militants on Pakistani soil. Islamabad sees them as violation of its territory.“These drones are very bad,” Ashraf Bhatti, an apparel merchant, was quoted as saying in the Anjuman bazaar in Lahore. “What would America think if someone started shooting rockets and killing people in their land?”

The anger and resentment remain so great, some here argue, that America loses far more in goodwill than it gains in assassinated militants. “It just hits everyday people like us,” said Mohammed Yasin, a retired shopkeeper. Some Pakistanis say they would be less distrustful of U.S. motives and objectives if Washington put a quick end to its “Af-Pak” terminology, strategy and mind-set, some told the The Times correspondent.

Besides Pakistanis, a number of lawmakers on the Hill have also questioned the use of the term Af-Pak, calling it an affront to the sense of sovereignty of the two nations. The American approach is meant to combine policy toward the two countries into a single cohesive plan, the dispatch pointed out. But people here say that while the region may look like one big mess from afar, there’s a world of difference between themselves and their neighbour to the west.

Pakistan, they say, is a nation with a functioning government, respected universities, a longstanding legal tradition and a vibrant arts tradition. Afghanistan is a land without much in the way of law, government or other conventional definitions of a nation, some contend.

“The majority of Pakistanis really don’t want to be put in the same category,” said Abid Sulehri, head of Islamabad’s Sustainable Development Policy Institute. “It’s very bad if they continue to use that term.”

David Kilcullen, a key adviser to the US Central Commander Gen David Petraeus told a Congressional committee last week that the predator strikes are creating more extremists than they are taking out the bad guys. He pointed out the drone attacks have taken out some al-Qaeda terrorists but they have killed 700 Pakistanis.

Pakistan and the United States have been cooperating closely since 9/11 in fighting al-Qaeda militants who crossed into Pakistani tribal areas when the U.S. swept the Taliban out of Kabul. The U.S. is a major economic and trade partner of Pakistan but has angered Islamabad with a series of drone attacks in its tribal areas. The Pakistani side is expected to raise the issue at Wednesday’s talks.-APP

NEW DELHI— Just as the election of Barack Obama for African Americans, the rise of Mayawati, India’s star woman politician, from the lowest rung of the social hierarchy is bringing hope of change for Indian Muslims.
“This Maya is no illusion,” M.J. Akbar, a veteran journalist and former lawmaker, told IslamOnline.net, referring to the nickname Mayawati is known with among Indians. “Maya is heaving against prejudice that has congealed over many thousands of years.”

Mayawati, chief minister of India’s most populous state Uttar Pradesh and leader of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), is a daughter of “Dalits,” the lowest rung of the Hindu social caste system commonly known as the “untouchables.”

But the woman, whose party is now a front runner in at least 10 states across India, is an inspiration for Muslims as well as millions of India’s lower-caste people. Akbar compares Mayawati to Obama citing her once unlikely rise from the margins and her extraordinary political skills.

“The Dalits are the blacks of India…and Mayawati is their Obama.” Mayawati became a national figure in 2007 after her party won a landslide victory in Uttar Pradesh state election. “She has proved herself to be a leader of the people who she has chosen to represent,” says Zohra Javed, a political activist.

The Dalits, meaning broken people, have long endured the prejudice and discrimination of India’s caste system which separates people into Brahmin priests, warriors, farmers, laborers, and those beyond definition including, the Dalits.

Though caste discrimination is outlawed, many of the 180 million Dalits, who make up one-sixth of India’s 1.1 billion population, insist bias against them persists.

Inclusive
Shafeeque Ansari, a Muslim businessman, believes Mayawati represents millions from the lower and marginalized sections of India from all religions and castes. “The rise of a regional leader like Mayawati symbolizes the empowerment of India’s marginalized lot.”

For many Muslims, Mayawati brings hopes for more inclusive politics to engage their own long-marginalized community. In the 2007 state elections, she fielded more Muslim candidates than ever before. “In the Uttar Pradesh elections, Maya fielded 403 BSP candidates. Of these 61 were Muslims,” Seema Mustafa, editor of India’s only political fortnightly magazine Covert, told IOL.

“Thirty Muslims won.”

In the ongoing, month-long parliamentary elections, Mayawati’s BSP is fielding more Muslim candidates than any other party, including the ruling Congress and the Hindu Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). Mayawati’s unique character, being a woman who knows about the plight of discrimination, and her vows to end religious divide in Hindu-majority India is also appealing to many others. “She has been able to add a slice of the minority vote bank to her kitty too,” notes Javed.

“Being a Muslim I would certainly want someone who would look sympathetically into the problems my community is facing.” Indian Muslims, who account for more than for 13 percent of the total population, have long complained of being discriminated against in all walks of life. Christians make up less than three percent and minorities such as Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains and Parsis account for nearly four percent.

Premiership
Mayawati’s spectacular rise left many predicting that she might do like Obama by rising to the top post in the country after the general polls. “A woman and a Dalit, somebody from a doubly disadvantaged group, becoming our Prime Minister would definitely be a sign that India has matured as a democracy,” Sharifa Siddiqui, a Muslim civil rights activist, told IOL.

“It means we have cocked a snook at the US in terms of choosing a leader from groups other than the traditionally elitist groups.” Mayawati’s party is part of the newly-formed Third Front, a coalition of 10 regional parties, which has 84 out of the 543 seats in parliament.

Third Front is taken seriously by many, especially those hoping for a non-Congress, non-BJP prime minister.
“The old cartelization of Indian politics, monopolized by high-caste leadership, is giving way to a new set of players from the lower strata of Indian polity,” argues Ghulam Muhammed, a political analyst.

But many doubt that the Barack Obama scenario can be repeated in caste-based India. Javed, the political activist, believes that a premier Mayawati is easier said than done. Though he is a strong supporter of the BSP leader, Ansari, the businessman, also shrugs off the possibility of premier Mayawati as unrealistic.

“To suggest her as a prime minister is akin to daydreaming.” But Akbar, the veteran journalist and former MP, says nothing is impossible in politics. “All options are possible. The turbulence and direction of change can never be certain.”
courtesy: Islam Online

Pakistan in the past 5 decades has greatly benefited from the astronomical rise of China’s re-entry in the corridors of world power. China has proven to be Pakistan’s time-tested friend and the two countries’ enjoy time-tested brotherly relations. Pakistan and China must focus on developing their relations to the next logical level. Currently, Sino-Pakistani coordination is mostly limited to national security issues such as development of military applications at cost-effective prices and a sprinkle of Chinese investment in Pakistan’s private sector for the development Pakistani industry. Both countries have time and time again identified the need to make their close relations be reflected by increased commerce and trade however this has been limited due to several structural and stability issues on the Pakistani front. Pakistan should focus on ways to fasten regulation and increase incentives for enhanced Chinese investment in Pakistan’s national economy. Cooperation between China and our country – and the ability of Pakistan to take not just from China’s tangible wealth but also to learn how they produced this wealth and regained their greatness can serve the interests of the rising aspirations of the Pakistani people.

Deng Xiaopeng, chairman of the Communist Party of China remarked that it is ‘glorious to get wealthy’. His remark set in motion the events of 1978, when China took steps to de-regulate its command-style economy and the restructuring that resulted in the conversion of the sleepy town of Shenzhen with a population of 5000 people in 1978 to a major world city with a per capita gross domestic product within the city that would compete with Western standards. Shenzhen was the first site of the Chinese experiment with a new form of Chinese communism – one which took some of the tenets of Marxist-Lennism, blended it with Chairman Mao’s desire for self-efficiency, self-reliance and ‘collectivization’, recognized the basic attributes of 5000 years of Chinese culture and psychology, and gave birth to ‘Communism with Chinese characteristics’.

From 1978 onwards, China has liberated over a three hundred million people out of poverty in mainland China. A Chinese middle class has emerged which makes Western multinationals envy the depth of the Chinese consumer’s pocket. While China may have abandoned collective industrial units of Mao or the collective farming societies, China has created a new form of collectivization. Whether this is inadvertent or not is simply not known, but the Chinese Nation thinks with one heart beat when it comes to perceive dangers to Chinese national interest. For example, the typically holier-than-thou patronizing behaviour of the French towards China annoyed the people of China to such an extent that they collectively used the depth and strength of their pockets to ignore French products. This resulted in a downward spiral of profits which were previously being enjoyed by French multinationals in China. At one point, France used to be the #1 destination for Chinese tourists. After the debacle in Paris when the French hosted that imposter the Dalai Lama and dared to intervene in Chinese internal affairs, France’s popularity dropped dramatically amongst the Chinese. The Chinese stood up for their country. France this summer was holding the rotating presidency of the European Union. The Chinese premier rightfully snubbed Sarkozy by calling the E.U-China summit off. President Zardari was able to ‘snub’ Gordon Brown over the illegal Pakistani student arrest issue by refusing to have a joint press conference only to honour Brown’s presence in Islamabad by having our Prime Minister shake hands appear with Gordon Brown in the press conference and Mr.Brown showed neither remorse nor pain for the emotional horror he caused to the families of those ten innocent Pakistani students – a national disgrace for our pride.

Pakistan is not as weak as her civilian leaders make it seem. In the 1970’s, China was surrounded by hostile states. The U.S was considering the possibility of diplomatic relations with the Revolutionary Republic but it remained hostile to China. The Soviet Union and China were increasingly in an estranged relationship and there was a massive military mobilization on their mutual borders and as a consequence there was a genuine split between both countries. China and its neighbour Vietnam were having tensions, while China’s friction with Japan and South Korea remained hot due to both countries hosting American military bases and the conflict in the two Koreas. In between all of this, there was a recalcitrant India under the leadership of Indira Gandhi who had just defeated China’s principal ally Pakistan and she showed signs of wanting to pick a fight with China to avenge the 1962 national humiliation the Chinese delivered to their largest South Asian neighbour in a brief but bitter war. Yet no one could challenge China. China focused on internal development and decided to make itself internally strong.

What began in 1978 transformed the imagination of the Chinese people. In little over a decade, China marched straight to economic progress and technical recovery. By the turn of the millennium, China’s share in global trade took an increasingly upward trend. China averted a South East Asian recession in 2000 when the tech bubble burst in America caused American demand of products from Japan, South Korea, Philippines and Malaysia to decrease significantly. China however in less than 30 years had managed to build up the required capacity to consume those products and hence cushioned the effects of the tech bubble crisis spilling over to South East Asia. Trade and commerce are not just activities for generating employment but should also be used as instruments of foreign policy.

China’s grand stock of over $1.5 trillion in foreign reserves makes it one of the most powerful countries in the world today. While on news we read about Obama announcing stimulus packages, the Chinese are out there too announcing $600billion stimulus packages for their own national economy. While the principal pillar of growth in China since 1978 has been foreign direct investment, in the year 2008 domestic consumption overtook foreign direct investment in size and its totality.

Pakistan needs to learn from China. We cannot just go with a beggars bowl and ask for $500 million every now and then from Beijing. They are our friends and they care for us because they realize the importance Pakistan can play in the emerging world order. But we cannot be part of the new world order that is coming if we remain addicted to peanuts and crumbs because this is making our decadent political elite even more decadent while Pakistanis are unable to realize the Pakistan Ideal.

Pakistan must learn from China. We must focus on developing a holistic trade policy with China. Chinese investment in Pakistan is critical. The technicalities of what China should or should not invest in are a totally different topic, but the main areas need to be mentioned. The need for

• a fibre optic cable connecting Pakistan and China,
• building consumer and cargo railways along the Karakoram Highway,
• enhanced technical partnership,
• enhanced educational partnership,
• and enhanced energy,
• water security, and
• crop production coordination are the areas
• besides defence where China can play an instrumental role.

This will bold well for our national security and help connect Islamabad into a closer orbit with Beijing. The need to promote Mandarin in Pakistan is also needed. While China has instructed many of its institutions to dedicate a certain portion of their staff to learn Urdu (or any other language that would help China), Pakistan has failed to do this. Pakistani officials can sometimes be so insensitive to China that while the Chinese Ambassador to Pakistan was gifting medals and presents to special Pakistani participants in the Special Peoples’ Olympics, Pakistani officials were busy asking Chinese journalists to sit in the back so that foreign (read European and American journalists) could sit in the front while Zardari would unleash the inimitable light he withholds within and which no one can sense or feel at a press conference few months ago. This is not just comical but it is also painful. Get over the hangover that the white man is the master. He is not. We are the masters of our own destiny, as China has demonstrated.

Pakistan is today surrounded by hostile states with the exception of China and the on-again, off-again double-mindedness of Iran. Even though most of us believe the current rounds of tensions with India began after the Mumbai tensions and allegations, this is not true – they merely came to the surface.

• Indo-Pak tensions have been building since 2004 when India unilaterally began constructing dams in Indian-occupied Kashmir, unilaterally violating the Indus Water Treaty and as a consequence severely cutting the water flow of Pakistani rivers and effecting our food security, energy security, and water security.
• Our tensions have also been rising because of Pakistani support to Sri Lanka’s War Agaisnt Terrorism. Our neighbour has been very unhappy of Pakistani assistance in training the Sri Lankan Air Force in precision guided aerial-bombing which has in fact been instrumental in the current success of Sri Lanka in stamping out the Tamil Tiger Threat.

We must not waiver in our conviction that we have the sovereign right to manage our relations bilaterally with who ever we chose to do so and however we choose to do so. We also must have the conviction in ourselves that we have the right to choose how we wish to perceive any 2nd country and for that matter President Obama should kindly focus on the appalling failure of the U.S in Afghanistan and not focus in Pakistan bashing.

However, the emerging dente in America is to de-hyphenate the Western World’s relationship with India and disregard Pakistani and Kashmiri sensitivity with regard to the ongoing occupation in Indian-occupied Kashmir. This emerging dente is the most dramatic change in the South Asia power equation since decades. The only other changes which occurred were the dismemberment of East Pakistan in 1971 and the creation of a Pakistani atomic weapon which had such a profound implication on the regional security of Pakistan. Who does Washington think it is to firstly decide for the entire Western World and also to stab Pakistan in the back once again? Washington is strong in international affairs, but not as strong as it used to be. This creates a creative dynamic in the corridors of world power and Pakistan can manoeuvre smartly if we took the right steps.

What does Pakistan do in the face of a rising pro-India sentiment in Washington? When in doubt, look to Beijing. While we look to Beijing, we should not expect that the Chinese will always be there. Hence we must introspect. While we introspect, we should take Chinese ideas on the sort of actionable change they were able to bring and then we would make the defence of Pakistan impregnable. For now, Pakistan must deeply search its soul and we must all collectively ask ourselves why our parliamentary democracy has failed in living up to the expectations and zeal of the Pakistan Movement. The answer to this is the ‘FM’ word, and feudalism is bad. But the feudal mentality of Pakistan’s decadent political elite reeks of backwardness and is not going anywhere soon. They would rather meet foreign politicians, foreign leaders, and foreign envoys while compete against other feudal-minded personalities’ on how much they are willing to sell our dignity and our sovereignty for a wink (read chance) to sit in the seat of power in Islamabad and the four provinces. Pakistan is in need of a Pakistani Deng Xiaopeng. A man or woman who will display the courage, the audacity, the credentials, and the eloquence needed to march Pakistan to the path of technical capacity, economic prosperity, and intellectual wealth. This will also ensure that a strong sovereign Pakistan emerges which is capable of standing up for its strategic interests externally in this region and beyond. If Pakistan could banish forever the corruption of the feudal mentality, provide some semblance of stability, and adopt ‘Deng Xiaopeng Thought’, then we could really ensure that rooti, kapra, makan would be more than just rhetoric and make it a reality. We could then also aspire for Gari, tahleem, and an avaaz. This voice would be strong and would reflect the imagination of the Pakistani people. Even the moon would be within our reach – as China has demonstrated.

WASHINGTON: The Obama Administration has acknowledged Islamabad’s determination to fight militants in its northwestern areas and denied reports claiming that Washington had given a two-week timeframe to Pakistan to take a decisive the Taliban militants. State Department spokesman Robert Wood said while stressing the need for a continued anti-terror efforts.

“I’m not aware of any two-week timeline. This is not something you can put into a timeline in terms of taking action. As I said, it has to be consistent, decisive. And we just need to understand that this is not something we’re going to be able to deal with in two days, two weeks, two months. This is going to take time, And Pakistan seems willing to go in that direction, and we’ll continue to try to help them, as they move in that direction,”

“We have said very clearly that we believe the Pakistanis need to take action against these extremist elements. And clearly, the Pakistanis are, you know, trying to do that. We’re going to be working with them, providing assistance where we can, as well as other countries around the world who believe that it’s critical to international security that we deal with the Taliban, and those extremists that are operating not only in Pakistan, but in Afghanistan as well. So obviously, Pakistan is doing this out of its own in its own national security interests,” Wood said in response to a question at the daily briefing. He added

“And this has been, I think, a positive last couple of days in terms of Pakistan taking action against these militants. And so, but we’re under no illusions. It’s going to take more than two days worth of actions. It’s going to take consistent, determined, and forceful action. And Pakistan seems committed to that, and we’re willing to be as helpful as we can in terms of dealing with the militants.”

-APP

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan is likely to get additional funding of $4.5 billion from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the US Government is also mulling to release more funds to Islamabad. According to a private TV channel, the amount of $4.5 billion is apart from the $4.5 billion that has been approved thus it is likely to double the figure making $9 billion.

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and US Defence Secretary Robert Gates have said that Pakistan needs aid on the urgent basis. According to reports, the sources have confirmed that on the directions of US President Barack Obama, payment of $1 billion from Coalition Support Fund is expected in the current month while the amount of $497 million is likely to be approved demanded by US Secretary of State. According to report, $1.5 billion would be transferred to Pakistan’s account from the United States at the end of current month.-ONLINE

NEW YORK: General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, Chief of staff of the Pakistan Army, has been named in a list of 100 most influential people in the world by Time, a leading American magazine. The list also includes international figures like US President Barack Obama, French President Nicolas Sarkozy, German Chancellor Angela Markel and Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al?Maliki.

Among women leaders are: American First Lady Michelle Obama; US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton; Saudi Arabia’s first woman minister Nora al?Faiz; Republican Party’s vice presidential candidate in 2008, Sarah Palin; and an Afghan woman activist Surraya Pakzad.

The only military leader figuring in the list is Gen. David Mckiernan, commander of the US?led coalition troops in Afghanistan. The annual Time 100 list was published in the latest issue of Time magazine which hit the news?stands on Friday. Also on the list are a number professionals in various fields, including the Indian musician, A. R. Rahman.

Gen. Kayani, 57, who is placed at No. 19 on the list—a step ahead of President Obama—is Admiral Mike Mullen, the top military office’ of the United State.

In a writeup, Admiral Mullen, the chairman of U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, said of Gen. Kayani, “Here is a man with a plan, a leader who knows where he wants to go. He seemed to understand the nature of the extremist threat inside Pakistan, recognized that his army wasn’t ready to meet that threat and had already started working up solutions.

“So far he’s done everything he told me he would do. He said he would provide the Frontier Corps with material support and strong leaders. He did it. He said he would send more Pakistani army troops to the northwest border region. He sent nearly 2,000. He said he would use those troops to go after alQaeda and extremist groups in Bajur and the Swat Valley. They have mounted several operations in just the past few months.

“There’s much more to do, of course. But I also think it’s important to look at what Kayani hasn’t done. For starters, he hasn’t let the army meddle in politics. Kayani helped foster a peaceful outcome to last year’s constitutional crisis, but he did it in a way that was totally in keeping with his military responsibilities.-APP

WASHINGTON: U.S. President Barack Obama on Wednesday voiced confidence about the security of Pakistan’s nuclear assets and renewed his administration’s strong support for the country’s stability beset with challenges from militants. Obama told a White House Press conference, marking first one hundred days of his presidency.

“I’m confident that we can make sure that Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal is secure. Primarily, initially, because the Pakistani army, I think, recognizes the hazards of those weapons falling into the wrong hands. We’ve got strong military-to-military consultation and cooperation,”

He declined to be drawn into any hypothetical worst case scenarios about Pakistani nuclear assets and whether the U.S. could ensure their security, if need be. He responded.

“I’m not going to engage in hypotheticals of that sort. I feel confident that that nuclear arsenal will remain out of militant hands,”

Obama said he is ‘gravely concerned’ about the situation in Pakistan not because the Taliban will take over it but because the country does not have the capacity to deliver basic services in all areas like schools, health care, rule of law, a judicial system that works for the majority of the people.

He expressed his administration’s resolve to strengthen the government’s hand toward acquiring that capacity to deliver. “So we need to help Pakistan, help Pakistanis.”

He felt Pakistan is now realizing that the menace of extremism and not India is the biggest threat facing them.“And you’re starting to see the Pakistani military take much more seriously the armed threat from militant extremists. “We want to continue to encourage Pakistan to move in that direction. And we will provide them all of the cooperation that we can.”

“We want to respect their sovereignty, but we also recognize that we have huge strategic interests, huge national security interests in making sure that Pakistan is stable and that you don’t end up having a nuclear-armed militant state.”

WASHINGTON:

The U.S. should persuade India to pull back its troops from Kashmir so that Pakistan could focus more effectively on the fight against violent extremism,

a key Republican senator said as lawmakers urged Washington against dictating terms to Islamabad.

Appearing on FOX News Senator Kit Bond, the top Republican on the Intelligence Committee and Democratic Senator Carl Levin, chairman of the Armed Services Committee, favoured U.S. economic and security assistance for the key South Asian country, considered by the Obama Administration as critical to its anti-terrorism success in Afghanistan.

Bond was asked what the United States could do to help Pakistan fight and offset the Taliban influence in some northwestern parts of the country. Bond said:

“I visited Pakistan and we looked in great deal into what’s going on. Number one, we need to convince India to move its troops off the (Line of Control) in Kashmir so we, the Pakistani military, under General (Ashfaq Parvez) Kayani, can move them back to fight the terrorists, But we need to get the Pakistani troop over there (on border with Afghanistan). We can provide them whatever guidance, logistics or intelligence they want”

Bond said President Barack Obama has announced the good framework for a policy for Afghanistan and Pakistan, but he has to make it clear that it’s going to be a full-fledged counter insurgency strategy, which leads to durable success.

Democratic Senator Levin agreed, saying “Well, I basically agree with that. Only the Pakistanis can save themselves. They’ve got to make a decision what kind of country they want. We can be of assistance to them. “We can support them. We can provide intelligence. We can provide other kinds of support, particularly economic support, providing it’s going to be effective.

“But it’s kind of like Iraq. We can be helpful, but we can’t dominate. We can’t dictate. Only the Pakistanis, like only the Iraqis, can resolve their own political issues and save their own country.”
input from agencies