How Mike Pompeo as US Secretary of State may not go well for Pakistan?
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ISLAMABAD - Former Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Chief and new US State Secretary Mike Pompeo appointment may not go well for Pakistan.
Former CIA Chief had openly warned Pakistan in the near past over alleged safe heavens and went to an extent of action in case of failure.
Pompeo, who was yesterday announced the next US Secretary of State replacing Rex Tillerson, has called Pakistan a safe haven for terrorists who continue to threaten US.
Taking Trump's line that Pakistan is safe terror haven, as exemplified in in his New Year Day tweet that "the United States had foolishly given Pakistan more than 33 billion dollars in aid over the last 15 years, and they have given them nothing but lies and deceit, thinking of the US leaders as fools," Pompeo has said in interviews*.
Reminding Pakistan of trying to fix the problem itself, Pompeo said in an interview to the CBS last month, "We are doing our best to inform the Pakistanis that that it is no longer going to be acceptable" and added that "if Pakistan could fix this problem, we're happy to continue to engage with them and be their partner, but if they don't, we're going to protect America."
Before that, in December 2017, Pompeo, just weeks before Trump's 'now or nothing' warning, had warned Pakistan to weed out terrorism from its safe havens.
When Pompeo was asked how the job would be done, quoting US Defence Secretary James Mattis who was in Pakistan then, he said, "Mattis will make clear Donald Trump's intent and will deliver the message that we would loveyou to do that" and warned that "in the absence of the Pakistanis achieving that, the US would be going to do everything it can to make sure that that safe haven no longer exists."
