We’re not your hired gun, defiant Imran tells US
Pak PM asks Washington to follow Beijing’s footsteps
Prime Minister Imran Khan has accused the US of “pushing Pakistan away” and said he would never want to have a relation with Washington where his country is treated like a “hired gun”.
“I would never want to have a relationship where Pakistan is treated like a hired gun - given money to fight someone else’s war,” Khan said in an interview with The Washington Post on Thursday.
The Pakistan prime minister was referring to the 1980s war against the Soviet Union and the ongoing war on terror.
“We should never put ourselves in this position again. It not only cost us human lives, devastation of our tribal areas, but it also cost us our dignity. We would like a proper relationship with the US,” he said.
Asked to elaborate on the ideal nature of relationship that Islamabad would like to have with Washington, Khan said, “For instance, our relationship with China is not one-dimensional. It’s a trade relationship between two countries. We want a similar relationship with the US.”
He said Pakistan was not “hedging” towards China, rather it was Washington’s attitude that had brought a change in the bilateral relationship.
“The US has basically pushed Pakistan away,” he said.
Asked why he “harboured anti-US sentiments”, Khan said disagreeing with Washington’s policies did not make him “anti- American”.
“This is a very imperialistic approach. You are either with me or against me,” he said.
Khan condemned the 2011 US operation in Abbottabad that killed Osama bin Laden, saying it was “humiliating” that Washington did not trust Pakistan to kill the terrorist.
“It was humiliating that we were losing our soldiers and civilians and suffering terrorist attacks because we were participating in the US war, and then our ally did not trust us to kill Bin Laden,” he said, adding that the US “should have tipped off Pakistan”.
“We did not know whether we were a friend or a foe (of the US),” he said.
Referring to US President Donald Trump’s South Asia policy, Khan said he was committed to having dialogue to achieve peace in war-torn Afghanistan.
“I talked for years about how there was no military solution in Afghanistan and they called me Taliban Khan. Now I’m happy everyone realises there is only a political solution,” the Pakistan prime minister said.
PAK MILITARY SEEKS PEACE WITH INDIA
Pakistan’s military is making an unusually strong effort to mend ties with India, as top generals worry about a deteriorating economy amid fractious relations with Trump.
Current and former Pakistani military officials have told Bloomberg that both a slowing economy and pressure from Beijing to improve ties with the West is prompting the shift on India.
At the same time, they said, the Pakistan government is wary of becoming too dependent on China after Trump cut $2 billion in security aid.
Among the proponents of a detente with India is Pakistan’s powerful army chief, Qamar Javed Bajwa, who once served under an Indian general during a stint with a UN peacekeeping mission and is seen as more moderate than his predecessors.
Entering his final year in office, Bajwa last week called a move to ease border controls with India for visiting Sikh pilgrims “a step towards peace which our region needs”.