'Many problems facing Pakistan are direct result of past US policies': Hillary

[Naveed Yaseen]

WASHINGTON (May 21 2009): US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Wednesday praised the Pakistani drive against Taliban insurgents and acknowledged that many of the problems facing Pakistan are a direct result of the US policies over the past several decades and Washington's walking away from the region in the wake of Soviet Union's pullout from Afghanistan.

Appearing before Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Clinton hailed the nation-wide political support for Islamabad's ongoing anti-Taliban drive and reaffirmed the Obama administration's strong commitment to the democratic Pakistani government.

The Obama administration, she said, is encouraged by its relationship with Pakistan, observing that the wide-ranging relations with the key regional country are beginning to yield positive results.

"I believe if you go back and look at 30-40 years of American policy toward Pakistan, it is a quite uneven picture -- one step forward two steps back. One of the greatest state dinners ever given was for one of the Pakistani military dictators at Mount Vermont under President (John F) Kennedy.

"Our relationships ebbed and flowed. It has gone up and down. And I think it is fair to say that many of the problems we are dealing with today in the region are a direct result of American policy and funding (of mujahideen) in the 1980s, and our decision after the fall of the Soviet Union and the Berlin Wall to basically walk away and our inconsistent approaches for Pakistan and Afghanistan in the years following and then our big bets on another military dictator with (Pervez) Musharraf in the last eight years."

Clinton renewed Washington's firm support for the democratic government. "And to be just very candid, because many of you have lived through this, you tried to help -- figure out which way to go, we are making a commitment to the democratically elected government of Pakistan "to intensifying the personal as well as governmental relations between elected officials, administration officials, our military leadership, she stated.

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