Next few weeks crucial, says top US general

WASHINGTON: The next few weeks would be pivotal for Pakistan’s future, a top US general warned on Sunday, noting that the Pakistanis also realised this and had galvanised to protect their country from the militants.

In an interview with Fox News on Sunday, Gen David Petraeus, head of the US Central Command, pointed to Pakistan’s intensifying offensive against the Taliban in Swat as a sign its political leaders, people and military were united against the militants.

‘The actions of the Pakistani Taliban seem to have galvanised all of Pakistan,’ he said. ‘There is a degree of unanimity that there must be swift and effective action taken against the Taliban.’

The Obama administration has strongly backed the offensive launched last week when President Asif Ali Zardari was in Washington seeking support for fighting the militancy, which he said was a threat to the entire international community.

‘The next few weeks would be very important and, to a degree, pivotal in the future for Pakistan,’ said Gen Petraeus.

‘Certainly the next few weeks will be very important in this effort to roll back, if you will, this existential threat — a true threat to Pakistan’s very existence that has been posed by the Pakistani Taliban,’ he added.

The general dismissed the suggestion that if the fight against the Taliban intensified, it could also endanger Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal.

‘With respect to the nuclear weapons and sites that are controlled by Pakistan, as President Obama mentioned the other day, we have confidence in their security procedures and elements and believe that the security of those sites is adequate,’ he said.

The US general said the trilateral talks in Washington last week enabled him to have ‘some good conversations’ with Pakistani leaders and officials.

‘It was very clear in discussions with everyone, from President Zardari through the other members of the delegation that there’s an understanding that this does have to be a whole-of-government approach,’ he said.

‘In other words, not just the military but all the rest of the elements of government (are) supporting the military,’ the general said.

Gen Petraeus noted that besides the military offensive, Pakistani authorities were also trying to re-establish basic services, repair the damage done by the bombardment of these areas in which the Taliban were located, and to take care of the internally displaced persons.

The US, he said, was also backing an ‘enormous effort’ to rehabilitate the internally displaced persons.

Various US agencies, he said, were working with the government of Pakistan to help them deal with this problem while UN agencies also were playing a frontline role in helping the refugees.

‘This is not a US assurance that matters,’ said the general when asked if the US government could assure the success of Pakistan’s offensive against the militants. ‘This is a Pakistani assurance. This is not a US fight … this is a Pakistani fight, a Pakistani battle, with elements that, as we’ve mentioned, threaten the very existence of the Pakistani state.’

Al Qaeda leaders: ‘There’s no question that Al Qaeda’s senior leadership has been there and has been in operation for years,’ said the general when asked if he knew where they were hiding. ‘We had to contend with its reach as it sought to facilitate the flow of foreign fighters, resources, explosives, leaders and expertise into Iraq, as you’ll recall, through Syria.

‘We see tentacles of Al Qaeda that connect to Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula in Yemen, the elements Al-Shabab in Somalia, elements in north central Africa, and that strive to reach all the way, of course, into Europe and into the United States.’

The general said it was not possible to determine the accurate location for Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri other than a general description of where that might be.

‘Certainly, they surface periodically. We see communications that they send out. And of course, they periodically send out videos in which they try to exhort people and to inspire individuals to carry out extremist activities.’