New York: US President Barack Obama urged “sustained and expanded” support for Pakistan at an international summit Thursday aimed at helping Washington’s nuclear-armed ally defeat extremism.
Obama, seated next to Pakistani President Asif Ali Zadari, told the meeting of the 26-member Friends of Democratic Pakistan that a US Senate vote for billions of dollars in aid for Islamabad was proof of US support.
All member nations, he said, shared an interest in the South Asian country’s future.
“We also face a common threat. The violent extremists within Pakistan pose a threat to the region, to the United States, and to the world. Above all, they threaten the security of the Pakistani people,” Obama told the summit, which he chaired with Zardari and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown.
Pakistan’s lawless semi-autonomous areas in the northwestern part of the country have been beset by violence after Taliban and Al-Qaeda rebels sought refuge there following the US-led invasion of Afghanistan in late 2001.
“We believe that hope can triumph over fear, and that adversity can be replaced by opportunity,” Obama insisted at the meeting held on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly in New York.
“Success will require a sustained and expanded commitment from the international community,” he said at a New York hotel, according to prepared remarks released by the White House.
As proof of Washington’s commitment to its key regional ally, the Senate voted Thursday to triple non-military aid to Pakistan to roughly 1.5 billion dollars per year through 2014.
The Senate’s unanimous approval set the stage for action in the House of Representatives, where the measure could be introduced as early as Friday with a vote expected soon thereafter that would send it to Obama to sign into law.
“We are here to meet our mutual responsibility for our future,” the US president said.
“We know that there are difficult challenges ahead. But that is why we must remain focused, we must be committed and we must stay together. As Pakistan makes progress, the United States will be there as a partner.”
Richard Holbrooke, the president’s special envoy to both Afghanistan and Pakistan, hailed the vote as “a very important step forward” for sometimes tense relations between the United States and Pakistan.
The measure, which seeks to use economic development to battle the despair that can fuel extremism, comes at a time when Obama has vowed to overhaul US strategy for Afghanistan and neighboring Pakistan.
The new aid would seek to foster economic growth and democratic reforms in Pakistan, notably by helping democratic institutions and the country’s educational system flourish.
The measure also authorizes unspecified military aid in sums necessary to help Pakistan battle Al-Qaeda and other Islamist fighters, but requires that such assistance flow through Pakistan’s democratically elected government.
It also demands that the government in Islamabad demonstrate a sustained effort to combat extremist groups and show progress towards defeating them.
Supporters of the legislation said it would help convince doubting Pakistanis that the United States will stand by them in what is likely to be a long struggle against extremists.
Democratic Senator John Kerry, the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and a lead author of the bill, said it would help “forge a new long-term relationship between the people of America and Pakistan.”
Holbrooke said the Pakistanis are coming to terms with the need to defeat the extremists sheltering along its unruly border area.
“There seems to be a growing recognition that the Taliban and other miscreants, to use the Pakistanis’ own word for this, are a threat to the entire country,” he said.
The Friends of Democratic Pakistan group — whose members include the United States, Britain, France, China, the United Nations
, the European Union and the World Bank — aims to support economic and social development as a means of stabilizing the nuclear-armed country.
