At the highest levels, US-Pakistan co-operation is said to be running smoothly, but underneath the relationship is under pressure, write KAREN DEYOUNG Oand PAMELA CONSTABLEin Washington
A NEW wave of anti-American sentiment in Pakistan has slowed the arrival of hundreds of US civilian and military officials charged with implementing assistance programmes, while also undermining co-operation in the fight against al-Qaeda and the Taliban and putting American lives at risk, according to officials from both countries.
In recent weeks, Pakistan has rejected as “incomplete” at least 180 US government visa requests. Its ambassador in Washington has criticised what he called a “blacklist” used by the Pakistani intelligence service to deny visas or to conduct “rigorous, intrusive and obviously crude surveillance” of journalists and non- governmental aid organisations it dislikes, including the Congress- funded International Republican Institute and National Democratic Institute.
“It would be helpful if the grounds for action against them are shared with the embassy,” the ambassador Husain Haqqani wrote in late July to Pakistan’s foreign ministry and the head of its inter-services intelligence.
Tension has been fuelled by widespread media reports in Pakistan of increased US military and intelligence activity – including the supposed arrival of 1,000 marines and the establishment of “spy” centres in houses rented by the US embassy in the capital, Islamabad.
US ambassador to Pakistan Anne Patterson has publicly labelled the reports false and has told media executives in a recent letter that publishing addresses and photographs of the houses “endanger(s) the lives of Americans in Pakistan”.
At the highest levels, bilateral co-operation is said to be running smoothly.
President Obama and Pakistani president Asif Ali Zardari met on Thursday in New York with a gathering of Pakistan’s international “friends”.
With Obama’s enthusiastic support, the Senate on Thursday approved a $7.5 billion (€5.1 billion) five-year package that will triple non-military aid to Pakistan.
The chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, Adm Mike Mullen, meets his Pakistani counterpart, Gen Ashfaq Kiyani, regularly.
But just below the top, officials in Islamabad and Washington say, the relationship is fraught with mutual suspicion and under such extreme pressure that it threatens co-operation against the insurgents.
“We recognise that Pakistani public opinion on the United States is still surprisingly low, given the tremendous effort by the United States to lead an international coalition in support of Pakistan,” Richard Holbrooke, the administration’s special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, said after Thursday’s meetings.
“We are a long way from this meeting to realities on the ground.”
As Obama grapples with US military proposals to greatly increase the number of US troops fighting the Taliban in Afghanistan, other options on the table include a stepped-up counter-terrorism campaign against al-Qaeda strongholds in Pakistan that would require more – not less – Pakistani support.
Recent Pew Research Center surveys in Pakistan found considerable support for the “idea” of working with the US to combat terrorism.
However only 16 per cent of Pakistanis polled expressed a favourable view overall of the US, and only 13 per cent expressed confidence in Obama.
Extremely sensitive about national sovereignty, Pakistanis oppose allowing foreign troops on their soil and have protested against US missile attacks launched from unmanned drones against suspected Taliban and al-Qaeda targets inside Pakistan.
Much of the recent upheaval has focused on US plans to expand the US embassy complex in Islamabad, a heavily guarded, 38-acre compound with nearly 1,500 employees, two-thirds of them Pakistani nationals.
About 400 new employees are to be added, half of them Americans. Reports of the expansion have led to rumours that at least 1,000 marines would also be arriving, along with new contingents of US spies.
In addition to repeatedly denying ulterior motives, the embassy has held press briefings and invited Pakistani reporters to tour its grounds.
Patterson appeared on local TV on Saturday to reiterate that Washington has no desire to take over the country and to state that there were only eight marines in the country, guarding the main embassy building. – (Washington Post service)