US to work on strategic bind in South Asia: Holbrooke

US special representative says the US paying attention to one country doesn't diminish support for others.

WASHINGTON: The US has good relations with Pakistan, Afghanistan and India and is working with the three countries, which exist in the “common strategic area”, to promote peace and stability in South Asia, US special representative for Pakistan and Afghanistan, Richard Holbrooke has said ahead of President Barack Obama’s visit to New Delhi.

Holbrooke said, “We want to be sure that everyone understands that when we pay attention to one country we’re not diminishing our support for the others.”

“When President Obama goes to New Delhi, in what will be a very important trip to strengthen US-Indian ties, it will not be at Pakistan’s or Afghanistan’s expense,” he said. The US will be working with all three countries to ensure peace and stability in South Asia, according to him.

“So, you have a picture here of the continuous engagement by the US in these three countries, which are so different with respect to culture, economy and history, yet exist in a common strategic area. The United States has good bilateral relations with Kabul, with Islamabad, and with New Delhi,” he stated.

“We therefore fully take into account the effects on the other two caused by our actions for one country. This is the underlying principle that our government utilises to formulate policies,” he remarked.

While referring to the US-Pakistan strategic dialogue, Holbrooke said that they had a very successful week with the government. Holbrooke will be travelling in two weeks to Islamabad for an important Pakistan Development Forum meeting. “It is the culmination of three prior conferences, two in New York and one held last week in Brussels. It is a long-scheduled, international effort to talk about long-term economic development in Pakistan. It will be run by the Pakistani government, and last week’s strategic dialogue with Pakistan also discussed this.”

Holbrooke, who attended the signing ceremony of the Transit Trade Agreement between Pakistani and Afghan ministers of commerce in Kabul on Thursday, hailed the development. “This is the most important agreement between Pakistan and Afghanistan since Pakistan’s independence. And it is more than a trade agreement; it is a political breakthrough as well, and it represents a move in the direction of one of the most critical goals that we have in that region, which is a closer relationship between Pakistan and Afghanistan, between Kabul and Islamabad.

“I cannot stress too highly that unless the two countries close that historic gap and work closely together, this war will go on no matter how successful we are elsewhere, for the simplest of reasons: the Taliban will exploit differences between the two countries.”

Published in The Express Tribune, October 31^st, 2010.