Pakistani Minister of Foreign Affairs Khawaja Asif said that the US was behaving toward Pakistan as “a friend who always betrays” after Washington suspended security aid and US President Donald Trump accused Islamabad of lies and deceit over many years.
Pakistan Movement for Justice leader and Legislator Imran Khan, who has been tipped as the next prime minister, said it was time for Pakistan to “delink” from the US and run down the US’s diplomatic and intelligence presence in what is a sensitive strategic area.
Washington has accused Pakistan of playing a “double game” by assisting the Afghan Taliban and Haqqani network militants who are causing chaos in Afghanistan.
Islamabad has denied this and accused the US of disrespecting its vast sacrifices in fighting terrorism, with Pakistani casualties numbering in the tens of thousands.
Anti-American sentiment and tense US-Pakistan ties are some way off their recent nadir in 2011, when late al-Qaeda head Osama bin Laden was killed in a secret US raid inside Pakistan, but the harsh rhetoric is likely to make it harder to mend future ties.
“The US behavior is neither that of an ally nor of a friend,” Asif told local Capital TV late on Thursday. “It is a friend who always betrays.”
Small groups of students chanting “death to America” and “death to Trump” burnt US flags and torched photos of Trump after Friday prayers in Islamabad and in the eastern city of Lahore. The organized protests ended swiftly.
Worsening ties might push Pakistan further into the arms of its long-time ally, China, which backed Islamabad after the fallout from Trump’s tweet.
Beijing’s diplomatic and financial support has also strengthened Pakistan’s hand, analysts say.
On Friday, Pakistan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs criticized what it called “shifting goalposts” after the US confirmed that it would suspend all security assistance, believed to total at least US$900 million, until Pakistan stopped assisting militants.
Other official government statements in response to Trump’s tweet have been measured, but Asif and several other prominent politicians have lashed out repeatedly.
“It is time for Pakistan to delink from the US,” Khan said in a statement, which called for an immediate removal of “excessive US diplomatic, non-diplomatic and intelligence personnel from Pakistan.”
Khan also called for a suspension of land and air transport routes through Pakistan that the US uses to resupply NATO troops in Afghanistan, a move Pakistani officials privately said is unlikely unless relations drastically deteriorate.
The US aid suspension was announced days after Trump tweeted that the US had foolishly given Pakistan US$33 billion in aid over 15 years and had been rewarded with “nothing but lies & deceit, thinking of our leaders as fools.”
The aid suspension was largely expected by Islamabad, but Pakistani officials were taken aback by Trump’s withering tweet and the tone of US announcements.
“The FBI, his political opponents, African-American football players are used to Trump criticizing them like this on Twitter — we are not used to it,” one Pakistani government minister said. “We were seriously shocked.”
Politicians such as Asif and Khan have been delivering anti-American statements partly to placate domestic audiences with one eye on general elections due toward the middle of the year, analysts said.
“This is the election period and for the first time in Pakistan’s history, anti-Americanism will become an issue in an election campaign,” Pakistani writer and analyst Zahid Hussain said.
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
HYPOCRISY? The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday asked whether Biden was talking about China or the US when he used the word ‘xenophobic’ US President Joe Biden on Wednesday called for a hike in steel tariffs on China, accusing Beijing of cheating as he spoke at a campaign event in Pennsylvania. Biden accused China of xenophobia, too, in a speech to union members in Pittsburgh. “They’re not competing, they’re cheating. They’re cheating and we’ve seen the damage here in America,” Biden said. Chinese steel companies “don’t need to worry about making a profit because the Chinese government is subsidizing them so heavily,” he said. Biden said he had called for the US Trade Representative to triple the tariff rates for Chinese steel and aluminum if Beijing was
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese