Zardari resists US pressure to expand Fata operations

In a letter to Barack Obama, President Asif Ali Zardari has turned down the US request for expanding Pakistani military operations in Fata, according to The Washington Post. Mr Zardari also urged the US president to speed up American military assistance to Pakistan and to intervene more forcefully with India for resolving bilateral disputes. He wrote the letter in response to a letter Mr Obama sent last month, urging Islamabad to step up operations against militants. Mr Zardari wrote that his government was determined to take action against Al Qaeda, the Taliban and allied insurgent groups attacking US forces in Afghanistan from the border areas in Pakistan. But, he said, Pakistan`s efforts would be based on its own timeline and operational needs. The newspaper said on Wednesday that Pakistan`s military chief, Gen Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, reinforced this message on Monday when he told Gen David H. Petraeus, the head of the US Central Command, that the United States should not expect “a major operation in North Waziristan” in the coming months. “The letters between the two leaders, while couched in diplomatic niceties and pledging mutual respect and increased cooperation against insurgents, reflect ongoing strains in a relationship that is crucial to both,” the Post observed. The newspaper noted that Mr Zardari, with a weakening hold on power and under strong military and political pressure, was anxious not to be seen as kowtowing to US pressure. The Post noted that both the military and the civilian government publicly deny cooperation with US attacks on insurgent targets inside Pakistan, launched from CIA-operated unmanned aircraft, and the US military`s use of two Pakistani air bases — Shamsi in Balochistan and Shahbaz in Sindh. The report said that Mr Zardari did not mention India by name in his three-page letter to Mr Obama, but he made repeated reference to Pakistan`s core interests, unresolved historical conflicts and conventional imbalances. He called on Mr Obama to push Pakistan`s neighbours towards diplomatic rapprochement with Islamabad. Pakistan`s counterterrorism efforts, Mr Zardari said, were based on the country`s own threat assessment and timetable. He noted that military operations in the Swat Valley alone had cost Pakistan $2.5 billion and said that Pakistan expected the United States to provide increased material support. The daily noted that the long-term success of Mr Obama`s new Afghanistan strategy depended on Pakistan moving forcefully against “Taliban havens in Fata and Balochistan” as Islamabad did not allow US ground troops to operate inside the country. The newspaper reported that in return for a three-fold increase in US assistance to Pakistan, Washington wanted Islamabad to launch an offensive against the Haqqani network of militants which the Americans said operated from North Waziristan. Officials who discussed Gen Petraeus`s meeting with Gen Kayani in Islamabad told the Post that the US general expressed some irritation at Pakistan`s complaints against the United States but accepted what one US official called Gen Kayani`s explanation of “the limits of their forces in terms of capacity”. Another US defence official told the newspaper that Pakistan was “already doing an extraordinary amount”. They were “a sovereign nation”, he said, and “all we can do is keep encouraging them to keep it up”. Gen Kayani, the official said, expressed concern that stepped-up US operations in Afghanistan were pushing insurgents into Pakistan. He said that the military had begun raids into North Waziristan and was working with tribes in the area to expel Uzbek and Arab insurgents.