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Clinton in Pakistan

October 21, 2011

Hillary Clinton is on a visit to Pakistan to urge the country to eradicate terrorists. The Pakistani Taliban has reacted to Clinton's statements by threatening war against opponents of the Islamic law.

https://p.dw.com/p/Rs6n
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton meets Pakistan's Prime Minister Youssaf Gilani in Islamabad, Pakistan, on Thursday Oct. 20, 2011
Hillary Clinton meets Pakistan's Prime Minister Yusuf Raza GilaniImage: dapd

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is in Pakistan to press Islamabad to dismantle Taliban safe havens, prompting the Pakistani Taliban to threaten to wage war against those opposing Islamic law.

'Remove safe havens'

The top US diplomat is also scheduled to participate in a forum with civil society leaders that will be broadcast live on television. US officials say Clinton will reiterate her arguments about the need for Pakistan to dismantle safe havens on its soil used by militants fighting US troops in Afghanistan.

On Thursday, Clinton had talks with Pakistan’s President Asif Ali Zardari and also met Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar, army chief General Ashfaq Kayani and Pakistan’s Inter-Service Intelligence’s (ISI) chief Ahmed Shuja Pasha.

On Thursday Clinton paid a visit to Afghanistan where she addressed a press conference with President Hamid Karzai. She declared that the US intended to push the Pakistanis "very hard as to what they are willing and able to do with us…to remove the safe havens and the continuing threats across the border to Afghans."

Tthis government ad on Pakistan's The News shows a picture of the radical cleric Maulana Fazlullah
Maulvi Fazlullah of the Pakistani Taliban is on a crusade to implement Sharia in PakistanImage: AP

Taliban threats

Following Clinton's statements in Afghanistan the Pakistani Taliban leadership has threatened to wage war against those who oppose Islamic Sharia law, as Reuters news agency reports. The Afghanistan based leader of the terrorist outfit, Maulvi Fazlullah, said he would return to his country "to get Sharia implemented in the Malakand region and the rest of Pakistan."

Fazlullah was the Pakistani Taliban leader in Swat Valley, about 160 km northwest of Islamabad, before a 2009 army offensive forced him to flee the area. According to Pakistan army’s spokesperson Major General Athar Abbas, Fazlullah has regrouped his fighters in Afghanistan and established strongholds, posing a threat to Pakistan once again.

ISI’s 'terrorist' links

The Pakistani Taliban, which is separate from the Taliban in Afghanistan, have declared war on Pakistan for providing support to the US-led war on terror. For their part Afghanistan and the US accuse the Pakistani government and its intelligence agency of supporting terrorists.

Relations between the US and Pakistan worsened in May this year, when US special forces found and killed al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden in Pakistan triggering a wave of allegations from both sides. Last month, an attack on the US embassy in Kabul led former senior US military officer, Admiral Mike Mullen, to claim that the militant Haqqani network was a "veritable arm" of Pakistan’s ISI.

Author: Manasi Gopalakrishnan (AFP, Reuters)
Editor: Grahame Lucas