QUETTA/ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s President Asif Ali Zardari called for a US change of policy and voiced opposition to missile strikes.
“As far as the question of policy is concerned we have to wait and see what is the new policy of (the) Obama government toward Balochistan and this region,” Zardari told a news conference.
He was speaking during a visit to Quetta, the capital of southwestern Balochistan province which borders Afghanistan and Iran and where an American UN official was kidnapped last month.
Obama announced a new strategy yesterday to “disrupt, dismantle and defeat” Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan and Pakistan and deploy an extra 4,000 military trainers.
US missile strikes anger many across nuclear-armed Pakistan and the government has warned that they risk a domestic backlash in a country where more than 1,600 people have died in extremist bombings in less than two years.
The New York Times reported last week that Obama and his top aides are considering expanding covert operations against Taleban leaders to Balochistan. “We hope that Obama is a name for change and in this change a new policy, a new approach can be adopted to the issues of this region, because this is a regional issue,” Zardari said. “As far as the drone attacks are concerned it is the stated policy of Pakistan government that we are against them,” he said. “We find them counterproductive and we do not encourage this exercise.” Zardari said Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani and the foreign ministry were in constant contact with the United States and other countries about missile strikes and the “war on terror.”
“Several meetings and exchanges of ideas have taken place,” he added. Some US officials fear that strikes in Balochistan could increase tensions with Pakistan, which said in late February it wanted to discuss ending controversial US drone attacks inside its territory, the New York Times said.
In February, John Solecki, a US citizen and the local head of the UN refugee agency (UNHCR), was kidnapped in Quetta. Baloch rebels claim to be holding him.
Earlier yesterday, a Foreign Ministry spokesman in Islamabad asked the US to reconsider missile strikes on its territory. “It is important that the US administration factors this in (regarding) its operational policy.”
Basit reiterated the government’s position that “drone attacks on our territory are a violation of Pakistan’s sovereignty and definitely counterproductive.”
Obama Thursday night called Zardari and discussed bilateral relations, situation in the region as well as other matters of mutual interest. A statement from the president’s house said the two leaders also discussed the Friends of Democratic Pakistan (FDP) forum initiative in their telephonic conversation.
The forum aims to promote and strengthen democracy in Pakistan. Zardari, who launched the FDP forum in New York in September 2008, will chair its meeting in Tokyo on April 17. President Obama expressed his support for democracy in Pakistan, the statement said.
-— With input from agencies
