Former president gen (retd) Parvez Musharraf has
said that there is immense pressure on Pakistan to roll back its
nuclear program, adding that the United States is conducting drones
attacks in Pakistan without the permission of Pakistan.
He said that the government should take measures at defence and diplomatic level to stop these drone attacks.
This he said in an interview with an Arab TV and addressing a seminar
organized by American think tank Carnegie Endowment for International
Peace at Washington.
He said that in his tenure of four years in government US conducted
nine drone attacks, adding that if his polices were responsible for the
creating current situation in Pakistan, then he had controlled the
situation of the country with these polices in his government.
He said that terrorism is not only single problem for Pakistan,
adding Pakistan is also facing problems of law and order, target
killings at Karachi, unstable political and economic condition and along
with energy crisis the budget deficit is out of control.
He said that in his tenure of government the dollar exchange rate is
stable at 60 rupees but the current government decreased the value of
rupee to 90 during four years, adding that main issues of Pakistan is
inflation, power, unemployment and lack of education.
Meanwhile addressing at the American think tank Carnegie Endowment
for International Peace, he described relations between the United
States and Pakistan as “terrible” but defended the Inter-Services
Intelligence (ISI) agency that American officials have accused of
supporting extremists.
Musharraf, who has lived in exile since stepping down in 2008 but
hopes to launch a political comeback next year, insisted that his
country’s historic rival India was working to turn Afghanistan against
Pakistan.
“Since our independence, Afghanistan always has been anti-Pakistan
because the Soviet Union and India have very good relations in
Afghanistan,” Musharraf said at the “We must not allow this to
continue,” he said. “We must not begrudge if Pakistan orders ISI to take
counter-measures to protect its own interests.”
Musharraf said Afghanistan could plunge into conflict along ethnic
lines after 2014, when the United States plans to withdraw its combat
troops from Afghanistan, ending more than a decade of war.
“Are you leaving a stable Afghanistan or an unstable Afghanistan?
Because based on that, I in Pakistan will have to take my own
counter-measures,”Musharraf said.
The “adverse impact will be on Pakistan, so any leader in Pakistan must think of securing Pakistan’s interests,” he added.
Musharraf criticized Mullen’s comments but said that Pakistan needed to do a better job explaining its position.
Musharraf criticized Mullen’s comments but said that Pakistan needed to do a better job explaining its position.
“They must prove to the world and to the United States: Is there a
problem? Do they have a different strategy as far as Sirajuddin Haqqani
is concerned? Is there a problem that the army is overstretched?” he
asked.
In an apparent bid to ease concerns in Islamabad, Karzai recently
said that Afghans would side with Pakistan in the event of war with the
United States, although he later said that his remarks were
misinterpreted.
Musharraf said it marked the first time Karzai has made a “pro-Pakistan statement,” but called his comments “preposterous.” SANA
