Thaindian News

Washington, May 19 (IANS) The United States has sought answers from Pakistan conveying the administration and lawmakers concerns about long-term national security following Islamabad’s failure to locate slain Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.

“We understand concerns raised in Congress in the wake of the bin Ladin raid, and we share some of those concerns,” State department spokesman Mark Toner told reporters Wednesday.

“We’ve been quite clear in conveying those concerns to the Government of Pakistan,” he said when asked about a letter by five senators to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton seeking an assessment of Pakistan’s commitment to and efforts towards the fight against terrorism.

Noting that the visit of chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, John Kerry, to Pakistan was being followed by US special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, Mark Grossman, Toner said: “we’re going to continue this dialogue.”

“We’ve also been consistent in saying that we believe this kind of counterterrorism cooperation is indeed in the interest of both our countries, our long-term national security interests, and we’re going to seek to move forward,” he said.

“But it’s also important to stress that we do have these concerns, we share them, and we want answers,” Toner said.

Asked about terror groups operating out of Pakistan, he said “a productive counterterrorism relationship with Pakistan” was “in our mutual interest.”

“We clearly have some concerns that we want to address, but we’re going to keep this moving forward,” he said.

Asked about the senators’ call for conditions-based aid to Pakistan, Toner said as “Kerry and others have made clear, we are asking them for some concrete actions.”

But “we’re interested in taking this relationship forward. We believe it’s in our best interest as well as in the interest of Pakistan, and we’re looking for ways to do that.”

(Arun Kumar can be contacted at arun.kumar@ians.in)