NEW YORK – The US and Pakistani officials got into a heated discussion onFriday regarding the circumstances surrounding the fight against terrorismand the sanctuaries of the Afghan militants inside the Pakistani territory.
Speaking at the UN Security Council debate on Afghanistan, the US DeputySecretary of State John Sullivan said the United States can’t work withPakistan if it continues to give sanctuary to terrorist organizations andneed to stop this and join efforts to resolve the Afghan conflict.
However, Pakistan’s U.N. Ambassador Maleeha Lodi countered that Afghanistanand its partners, especially the U.S., need to address “challenges insideAfghanistan rather than shift the onus for ending the conflict onto others.”
She also added that “Those who imagine sanctuaries outside need a realitycheck.”
This comes as the Afghan and US officials have long been insisting that theAfghan militants, particularly the notorious Haqqani terrorist networkstill have safe havens and freedom of action in Pakistan from where theyplan and coordinate attacks in Afghanistan.
A senior US State Department official said earlier this month that “Webelieve that there is significant evidence that leadership of the HaqqaniNetwork resides inside Pakistan and is able to plan and execute fromPakistan attacks inside Afghanistan.
So the disagreement is much more about those facts than it is on ouroverarching goals in the strategy.
And we need them to address these sanctuaries in order for us to be able tobe enabled to succeed in Afghanistan.”