Trump to send deputies to Pak with tough message
US president wants state support for terrorists to end
WASHINGTON:US President Donald Trump will dispatch his top diplomatic and military advisors to Pakistan in the coming weeks, turning up the heat on a nucleararmed ally accused of harbouring terror groups.
Weeks after Trump accused Islamabad of providing safe haven to “agents of chaos,” secretary of state Rex Tillerson plans to depart for Pakistan late this month. He will be followed by defence secretary Jim Mattis, according to sources.
The one-two punch is designed to drill home Trump’s message that Pakistani state support for jihadist groups has to end.
Washington has long been frustrated by Pakistan’s willingness to offer cross-border safe havens to Taliban factions and armed jihadist groups fighting US troops and their Afghan allies.
Trump came to office indicating that Washington’s frustration had reached the point where something had to give.
“We have been paying Pakistan billions of dollars at the same time they are housing the very terrorists that we are fighting,” he said in an August address.
But in the six weeks since, there have been precious few signs that the calculus in South Asia has changed.
Mattis told Congress this week that he will try “one more time” to “see if we can make this work.”
Visiting Washington, Pakistan’s foreign minister Khawaja Asif lashed out at “hollow allegations” about Pakistan harbouring terrorists as “not acceptable.” Privately, however, Pakistani officials complain about receiving no concrete requests to target terror groups.
US officials have been reticent to share some intelligence for fear of tipping off targets with links inside Pakistan’s government.