Pakistan, US can work for a secure world: Obama: Daily Times

ISLAMABAD: United States President Barack Obama on Saturday hoped that Pakistan and the US could work together in a spirit of friendship to build a more secure world. Responding to a felicitation message by Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani on assuming the office of the US president, Obama expressed his confidence that the two countries could jointly work to ensure global security in the next four years.

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An Open Letter--From Pakistan--To President Obama: Imran Khan: Forbes

Imran Khan

The U.S. and NATO should withdraw from Afghanistan.

Dear President Obama,

Your extraordinary ascent to the U.S. Presidency is, to a large part, a reflection of your remarkable ability to mobilize society, particularly the youth, with the message of "change." Indeed, change is what the world is yearning for after eight long and almost endless years of carnage let loose by a group of neo-cons that occupied the White House.

Understandably, your overarching policy focus would be the security and welfare of all U.S. citizens and so it should be. Similarly, our first and foremost concern is the protection of Pakistani lives and the prosperity of our society. We may have different social and cultural values, but we share the fundamental values of peace, harmony, justice and equality before law.

No people desire change more than the people of Pakistan, as we have suffered the most since 9/11, despite the fact that none of the perpetrators of the acts of terrorism unleashed on the U.S. on Sept. 11, 2001, were Pakistani. Our entire social, political and economic fabric is in a state of meltdown. Our sovereignty, dignity and self-respect have been trampled upon. The previous U.S. administration invested in dictators and corrupt politicians by providing them power crutches in return for total compliance to pursue its misconceived war on terror.

There are many threats confronting our society today, including the threat of extremism. In a society where the majority is without fundamental rights, without education, without economic opportunities, without health care, the use of sheer force and loss of innocent lives continues to expand the extremist fringe and contract the space for the moderate majority.

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Miliband condemns US 'war on terror': Business Recorder

MUMBAI (January 16 2009): British Foreign Secretary David Miliband on Thursday delivered a sharp critique of outgoing US President George W. Bush's foreign policy, declaring the concept of a "war on terror" was "mistaken." Speaking in India at one of the hotels targeted in the militant attacks on Mumbai, Miliband distanced the British government from the Bush administration shortly before Barack Obama takes over the White House.

"For a couple of years now the British government has used neither the idea nor the phrase 'war on terror,'" he said. "The reason is that ultimately the notion is misleading and mistaken. Historians will judge whether it has done more harm than good. But we need to move on to meet the challenges we face." Miliband said that the phrase "war on terror" had successfully "captured the gravity of the threats we face.

"But he said it "gave the impression of a unified, transnational enemy, embodied in the figure of Osama bin Laden and the organisation of al Qaeda," when in fact "terrorism is a deadly tactic, not an institution or an ideology." Echoing themes from an article he wrote in the British daily The Guardian ahead of the speech, Miliband suggested the phrase "war on terror" had actually helped extremists.

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Pakistan and Barack Obama: Barracking: Where Obamamania does not apply: Economist

THE global carnival sparked by Barack Obama’s election victory suggests unrealistic faith in his ability to change the way America deals with the world. But in Pakistan people are less drawn to the lofty rhetoric of change than they are repelled by another campaign pledge.

Mr Obama has said that when elected he would authorise cross-border operations to “hunt down” Taliban and al-Qaeda militants operating in the tribal areas of Pakistan. But as the drone missile attacks—and attendant civilian deaths—have mounted (see article), they have fired up both rural radicals and urban, middle-class moderates, whose national pride is wounded.

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Pakistani students resist global favourite Obama: Daily Times

* Students at two top universities term Democratic presidential hopeful ‘too aggressive’, ‘irresponsible’, ‘enemy of Muslims’
* Say Obama’s stance on Pakistan ‘even more dangerous than George W Bush’

Daily Times Monitor

LAHORE: Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama may be winning in the United States and most global popularity polls, but he is a loser in Pakistan, Washington Times reported on Tuesday.

Aggressive:

Dozens of students interviewed at two top universities in Lahore rejected Obama as ‘too aggressive’, ‘irresponsible’ and an ‘enemy of Muslims’, whose stated policy toward insurgency-plagued areas would make a bad situation worse.

The anti-Obama sentiments stem from assertions on the campaign trail that the senator from Illinois, if elected president, would authorise US forces to enter Pakistani territory to hunt down the Taliban and Al Qaeda.

“The only country he's talking about bombing today is us,” said Sher Afghen Malik, a political science major at the University of the Punjab, to the approving nods of classmates. “How could we possibly support him?”

Dangerous: Khansa Qamar, a member of the school's model United Nations club, said her peers perceive Obama “as even more dangerous than George W Bush” with regard to his stance on Pakistan.

By a show of hands, not one among the two-dozen students in one class supported the Democratic candidate. A little more than half said they prefer Senator John McCain because the Republican presidential candidate's statements on Pakistan have been less pointed.

Obama’s comments set Pakistan's media machine on spin cycle, hardening the views of many people who otherwise had been supportive of him, said Khalid Butt, a political science instructor at Government College in Lahore.

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Nato's lost cause: Guardian

The west's 'good war' in Afghanistan has turned bad. A local solution, rather than a neocolonial one, is what's needed

In the latest clashes on the Pakistan-Afghan border, Nato troops have killed 11 Pakistani soldiers and injured many more, creating a serious crisis in the country and angering the Pakistan military high command, already split on the question.

US failure in Afghanistan is now evident and Nato desperation only too visible. Spreading the war to Pakistan would be a disaster for all sides. The Bush-Cheney era is drawing to a close, but it is unlikely that their replacements, despite the debacle in Iraq, will settle the American giant back to a digestive sleep.

The temporary cleavage that opened up between some EU states and Washington on Iraq was resolved after the occupation. They could all unite in Afghanistan and fight the good fight. This view has been strongly supported by every US presidential candidate in the run up to the 2008 elections, with Senator Barack Obama pressuring the White House to violate Pakistani sovereignty whenever necessary. He must be pleased.

That the "good war" has now turned bad is no longer disputed by a number of serious analysts in the US, even though there is no agreed prescription for dealing with the problems. Not least of which for some is the future of Nato, stranded far away from the Atlantic in a mountainous country, the majority of whose people, after offering a small window of opportunity to the occupiers, realised it was a mistake and became increasingly hostile.

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