US defence secretary to press Pakistan

Robert Gates made an unannounced trip to Pakistan hoping to deepen ties and persuade the US ally to root out all militants, including Afghan Taliban factions.

ISLAMABAD // The US defense secretary Robert Gates made an unannounced trip to Pakistan today hoping to deepen ties and persuade the US ally to root out all militants, including Afghan Taliban factions. Mr Gates, on his first visit to Pakistan since President Barack Obama took office last year, told reporters he would also attempt to persuade a sceptical nation that Washington aimed to be an ally "for the long-haul".

Islamabad has mounted big offensives against Pakistani Taliban factions that are attacking the state but has resisted US pressure to attack Afghan Taliban in border enclaves who do not attack in Pakistan but cross the border to fight US troops. Pakistan has said it has its hands full with the Pakistani Taliban and cannot open too many fronts at the same time. But analysts have said Pakistan sees the Afghan Taliban as tools to counter the growing influence of old rival India in Afghanistan and as potential allies in Afghanistan if US forces withdraw and, as many Pakistanis fear, leave the country in chaos.

"What I hope to talk about with my interlocutors is this notion and the reality that you can't ignore one part of this cancer and pretend that it won't have some impact closer to home," Mr Gates told reporters travelling with him from India. Gates said in India yesterday that New Delhi may lose its diplomatic restraint with Pakistan in the event of any repeat of a Mumbai-style attack, and militants in the region may use this to provoke the two rivals to war.

Pakistan and the United States have been allies for years but ties have been strained by US calls for Pakistan to do more to stop militants crossing from its lawless ethnic Pashtun border lands to fight in Afghanistan. Mr Gates, referring to a "trust deficit" between the United States and Pakistan, said in a commentary published in a Pakistani newspaper today that the United States wanted to relinquish grievances of the past held by both sides.

The US was committed to a stable, long-term, strategic partnership with a democratic Pakistan, he said. America is sending 30,000 more soldiers to Afghanistan, and Pakistan is worried that will lead to a spillover of fighting across the border. * Reuters