News
Friday, March 21, 2008
Cheney expects new Pak govt to be ‘good ally’
* US vice president says new Pakistan govt has as ‘big a stake as anyone’ in militancy fight
KABUL: US Vice President Dick Cheney said on Thursday he expected Pakistan’s new government to be a “good and effective” US ally, as he made a surprise visit to neighbouring Afghanistan. “I have no reason to doubt their commitment to dealing with the problems that emerge,” the vice president said, referring specifically to the troubled Tribal Areas along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border. He said the new government, which vowed to take on President Pervez Musharraf, a close ally in the US-led “war on terror”, had “as big a stake as anyone else” in fighting militancy. Afghanistan has in the past accused Pakistan of harbouring militants along the mountainous border, but cooperation between the two has improved and both countries are now Taliban and Al Qaeda targets. “I have no reason to doubt their commitment to dealing with the problems that emerge from that area if terror groups are allowed to operate from there, in part because I think their government is a target for Al Qaeda and the extremists in the northwestern section of Pakistan,” Cheney said. afp/reuters
Courtesy Daily Times