Amid reports that the United States and Pakistan are to resume their stalled strategic dialogue in the near future, the State Department Monday said it looks forward to intensive engagement with Pakistan on wide-ranging issues.
A State Department spokesman said Washington wants the bilateral relationship with Pakistan back on track. “I don’t’ have a specific update. But, obviously, we want to get our relationship back on track. We look to the future of our relationship with Pakistan. So we look forward to more intensively engaging with them on a whole range of issues,” Spokesman Patrick Ventrell said at the daily briefing.
He was asked to comment on the revival of strategic dialogue between the two countries.
As an example of engagement, Ventrell cited Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s meeting in a trilateral core group with Pakistani and Afghan foreign ministers in Tokyo this month to coordinate on the way forward in Afghanistan. “We continue our intensive engagement with the Pakistanis, going forward,” he added.
He reiterated US satisfaction at the re-opening of the key Pakistani land routes for transportation of NATO supplies into Afghanistan. Ventrell said American officials are working with their Pakistani counterparts to clear the backlog of containers, resulting from an almost eight-month blockade of supplies through the ground lines of communication. “We are talking about a lot of backlog, a number of containers, very significant amount of material. So, it’s going to take some time to find an efficient way to get them all through,” the spokesman elaborated, when asked about technical work on transporting the supplies through Pakistan-Afghanistan border crossing.
COAS not going to US for strategic dialogue
News reports about Chief of the Army Staff (COAS) General Ashfaq Kayani going to the US to participate in the strategic dialogue are not true, sources in the military said on Monday. Earlier in the day, media reports quoted Defence Secretary Nargis Sethi as saying that General Kayani would visit Washington for the strategic dialogue and dates were yet to be finalised. However, the military sources denied the news, saying that General Kayani had no plan to participate in the strategic dialogue in the US.
Kiayani looks like a clown in dyed jet balck hair. He should more time worrying about Pakistan army's image than his own image. We could care less if his hair are balck or white. We care more about if Pakistan army is strong or not. All he need now is a red nose and big ears and he is ready for his circus job 🙂
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