Musharraf ignored banned terrorist groups: envoy

WASHINGTON, October 06 (Internews): Pakistan’s Ambassador to the United States Hussain Haqqani has said Musharraf did not take key decisions relating to the war on terror during the last year of his rule and many groups he claimed to have banned continued to function underground.

In an interview with US magazine The Washington Diplomat, Haqqani says the state of the US-Pakistan relations is much better than it looks in the pages of some newspapers because the press only focuses on events, not the overall process.

As for Musharraf, the magazine quotes the ambassador as saying: “The disgraced president is living a quiet life in the same house outside Islamabad that he occupied before, but that the new government has no intention of hounding him”.

He added: “Musharraf will not be victimized or made a target of any vendetta. It is not in Pakistan’s interest. But that doesn’t mean we will not [uphold] the rule of law. His government failed in providing Benazir Bhutto with adequate security, and now that the UN is investigating the matter, we will wait for the investigation to be completed.”

Haqqani further said: “No Pakistani wants foreign troops on Pakistani soil. And the people who understand that region know it is not in America’s advantage to land troops in Pakistan.

“But a lot of this is political noise and people here are asking why Osama bin Laden hasn’t been found in seven years. Why has the US not succeeded in stabilizing Afghanistan in the border areas?” he asked.

“So a simplistic answer is that we’re going to do something about Pakistan. I think once the American elections are held, we’ll go back to the Pentagon, the CIA, the State Department and elected political leaders of the United States working with Pakistan’s leadership and make this a collective effort.”

Haqqani said the war against terror is not going to be won by one partner in that war threatening another. It’ll be won by all partners working together.

“That means Afghanistan, Pakistan, Nato and the United States. Once the political noise subsides, Americans will find that a democratic Pakistan is a better ally in the war against terror,” he added.

“Political transitions are always difficult, but Pakistan has effected systemic change. For the first time, we have removed a military dictator without a coup or bloodshed in the streets,” he says.

“There will still be political squabbles and differences of opinion, but the fundamentals are in place for the government to come and go in an orderly manner,” Haqqani added.

“President Musharraf left Pakistan with a very bad economy. In his last year and a half, as popular resentment against him mounted, he tried to become popular by not passing on the higher costs of fuel and food, thereby creating an enormous fiscal deficit, he alleged.

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