Clinton ties Pakistan visit to cooperation on Bin Laden
SPECIAL TO WORLD TRIBUNE.COM
Friday, February 18, 2000
WASHINGTON -- U.S. President Bill Clinton plans to snub Pakistan
during a trip to south Asia next month in what officials said is meant to
protest Islamabad's refusal to cooperate in efforts to capture Saudi
billionaire fugitive Osama Bin Laden.
Officials said Clinton's visit is linked to Pakistan's willingness to
capture Bin Laden, located in neighboring Afghanistan. So far, the officials
said, Islamabad has rejected numerous appeals to press the ruling Afghan
Taliban militia to surrender Bin Laden, accused of masterminding the
bombings of two U.S. embassies in east Africa in 1998.
Diplomatic sources said a U.S. commando force arrived in Pakistan last
year in an attempt to launch a raid of Bin Laden's hideout. But they said
the effort was apparently stymied by the refusal of Pakistan to cooperate.
On Wednesday, Clinton said he could visit Pakistan in a trip to south
Asia scheduled for the week of March 20. The trip will include visits to
Bangladesh and India.
"I have decided that I am going to India and Bangladesh," he said. "And
I will make a decision about whether to go [to Pakistan] based on what I
think will best serve our long-term interest in non-proliferation, in trying
to stop particularly, the arms race, and trying to help promote stability,
democracy and a resolution of the
conflict between India and Pakistan."
Clinton did not cite the Bin Laden issue. He said he hoped his visit to
south Asia will help ease tensions between India and Pakistan.
A senior U.S. official said Clinton will urge India to sign the
Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty and the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. "And
as long as India persists in being a self-declared nuclear weapons state
outside the NPT," the official said, "there are going to be certain
limitations on the relationships that a number of countries including the
United States and Japan are going to be able to have with India."
Friday, February 18, 2000
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