U.S. links improved ties with Pakistan to aid on Bin Laden

WASHINGTON -- The United States continues to press Pakistan to cooperate in efforts to capture Saudi billionaire fugitive Osama Bin Laden.

Pakistan officials have responded with concerns that the U.S. policy will make enhance Bin Laden's popularity according to Pakistan press reports.

U.S. officials said the issue was at the top of the agenda in last week's high level talks between Washington and Islamabad. The officials said the Clinton administration linked Pakistan's help in capturing Bin Laden to an improvement in relations with Islamabad.

Over the weekend, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for South Asia Karl Inderfurth completed a two-day visit to Islamabad, in which he met government leaders and representatives of the ruling Afghan Taliban faction. Taliban is said to be harboring Bin Laden and has received the support of the government in neighboring Pakistan.

Inderfurth was accompanied by State Department counterterrorism coordinator Michael Sheehan and National Security Council member Donald Camp, who heads south Asian affairs.

"Pakistan's support of the Taliban, who harbor and protect Osama Bin Laden, is a concern to us," Inderfurth said on Friday in Islamabad. "The continuing presence of Bin Laden and his network in Afghanistan, we believe, is a threat to the international community. We urge the government of Pakistan to use its influence with the Taliban to have Bin Laden expelled to a place where he can be brought to justice as called for in Security Council Resolution 1267."

Bin Laden is suspected of having masterminded the bombings of two U.S. embassies in east Africa in 1998. Taliban sources said the representatives again rejected a U.S. demand to surrender Bin Laden.

U.S. officials said Pakistan has been told that Washington is ready to improve relations with neighboring India but will wait to do the same with Islamabad until it moves against Bin Laden. They said the issue has become critical as Bin Laden is believed to have launched a campaign to attack American targets in both the United States and abroad.

But Inderfurth said Pakistani leaders have so far refrained from any commitment to cooperate in the capture of Bin Laden. He acknowledged that Pakistan is regarded as having increased its support to Islamic terrorists over the past year.

"I cannot say that we have received assurances in this regard, but we do believe that it is important to continue to restate the urgency from the standpoint of the United States and the international community that Bin Laden be expelled and be brought to justice," he said. "We hope that day will happen very soon."