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US pressure on Zardari to align with PML-Q: Report
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The change in
Only last week did the US officials reach a hushed understanding with Musharraf to intensify secret strikes against suspected terrorists by pilotless aircraft in Pakistan, New York Times has reported quoting senior officials in the administration.
But the sudden change in political circumstances after the key polls in
The new deal has in fact allowed the
The paper says President Bush's national security advisers had a series of meetings with top
The change allows American military commanders greater leeway to choose from what one official who took part in the debate called "a Chinese menu" of strike options, the paper claimed.
The new deal has given the
Such an outright operation was kept secretly earlier to avoid embarrassing President Pervez Musharraf [Images] politically, the article says.
Musharraf has been accused by political rivals of being too close to the
The paper says the
The new deal, the paper says, came Mike McConnell, the director of national intelligence, and General Michael V. Hayden, the CIA director took a trip to the
The officials are learnt to have met with Musharraf and new army chief Ashfaq Parvez Kiyani and offered a range of increased covert operations.
But now the deal is in a spot.
Xenia Dormandy, the director for
The paper says other administration officials warned not to read too much into initial comments from Asif Ali Zardari, the leader of the Pakistan People's Party and widower of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto, about reaching accords with the tribal leaders. Zardari, they noted, has made clear that he wants to defeat terrorism.
"In the short term, there will be some confusion and some hiccups," Henry A Crumpton, a former top State Department counterterrorism official told the paper.
"But in the medium and longer term, there will be continued and perhaps even closer cooperation, because of our mutual interests."
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