Pakistan\u2019s newly-elected Prime Minister Imran Khan met with US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in Islamabad on Wednesday, saying he was \u201coptimistic\u201d he could reset the relationship with Washington after the US suspended aid over the country\u2019s alleged failure to combat militants.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou know I\u2019m a born optimist,\u201d said Khan, a former cricket star who was sworn in last month. \u201cA sportsman always is an optimist. He steps on the field and he thinks he\u2019s going to win.\u201d<\/p>\n
Pompeo spent just four hours in Pakistan, his first visit to the country. At the airport before leaving for India, he said he was \u201chopeful\u201d that a foundation had been laid to move forward.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve still got a long way to go, lots more discussion to be had,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s time for us to begin to deliver on our joint commitment… We\u2019ve had lots of times where we\u2019ve talked and made agreements, but we haven\u2019t been able to actually execute those.\u201d<\/p>\n
Pompeo held meetings with Khan, Pakistan\u2019s foreign minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi and the powerful Army Chief Gen. Qamar Javed Bajwa.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe talked about their new government, the opportunity to reset the relationship between our two countries across a broad spectrum, economic, business, commercial,\u201d Pompeo said.<\/p>\n
He said they also discussed \u201cthe work that we all know that we need to do to try to develop a peaceful resolution in Afghanistan that benefits certainly Afghanistan, but also the United States and Pakistan.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m hopeful that the foundation that we laid today will set the conditions for continued success as we start to move forward,\u201d he said on the tarmac before leaving.<\/p>\n
The United States last weekend cancelled a $300 million Coalition Support Fund payment to Pakistan after long complaining that it was not doing enough to combat the Taliban and other militants who attack Afghan and US forces across the porous border.<\/p>\n
Pakistan has rejected those allegations, saying it has played a key role in the U.S.-led campaign against extremists that began after the 9\/11 attacks.<\/p>\n
On the plane to Pakistan, Pompeo announced his appointment of Zalmay Khalilzad, a veteran diplomat who is unpopular in Pakistan, as the new US special adviser on Afghan reconciliation, which could further complicate relations with Islamabad.<\/p>\n
Khalilzad \u201chas been very critical of Pakistan in the past and his appointment will not help move things forward,\u201d said Zahid Hussain, a defence analyst and the author of two books on militancy in the region.<\/p>\n
Khalilzad was born in Afghanistan and served as U.S. special envoy to the country following the collapse of the Taliban from 2001-2003 and then as U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan from 2003-2005.<\/p>\n
He has been critical of Pakistan, often blaming Afghanistan\u2019s deteriorating security and country-wide chaos on Pakistan\u2019s military and powerful ISI intelligence agency, accusing them of harbouring and aiding Taliban insurgents.<\/p>\n
Khalilzad has been criticized for his role in cobbling together an Afghan government of warlords headed by Hamid Karzai following the Taliban\u2019s collapse. Afghanistan\u2019s corruption-plagued government and, by some accounts, poorly trained security forces have frustrated Afghans and contributed to the country\u2019s deteriorating security situation.<\/p>\n
Neither the US nor Pakistan can afford a complete rupture in relations, but Hussain said Islamabad is frustrated that the relationship has been reduced to a single issue: Afghanistan.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe United States seems only to see Pakistan through the prism of Afghanistan,\u201d he said. \u201cThe main thing is we would like to be allies with the US but with dignity.\u201d<\/p>\n
As an opposition leader, Khan often chastised Pakistan\u2019s reliance on U.S. financial assistance. He briefly stopped trucks supplying fuel and other goods to US and NATO troops from crossing into Afghanistan to protest U.S. drone strikes in Pakistan\u2019s tribal regions along the border.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Pakistan\u2019s newly-elected Prime Minister Imran Khan met with US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in Islamabad on Wednesday, saying he was \u201coptimistic\u201d he could reset the relationship with Washington after the US suspended aid over the country\u2019s alleged failure to combat militants. \u201cYou know I\u2019m a born optimist,\u201d said Khan, a former cricket star who […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":41376,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[87],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-41375","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41375","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41375"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41375\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":41377,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41375\/revisions\/41377"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/41376"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41375"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41375"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41375"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}