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Clinton’s Pakistan mission

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Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has been meeting tribal leaders in north-west Pakistan on the last day of a testing visit to the country. During her three-day trip Mrs Clinton hoped to strengthen ties between the US and Pakistan and tried to address a rising tide of anti-American feeling. Matthew Bell has the story.

• BBC coverage
• Pakistan’s growing anti-US anger
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KATY CLARK: I’m Katy Clark and this is The World. Hilary Clinton today wrapped up what might have been her toughest diplomatic mission yet as secretary of state. She spent three days in Pakistan. There she met with political and military leaders as well as university students and leaders from the northwest tribal region. Clinton heard from Pakistanis who are increasingly angry about US policies there. But as The World’s Matthew Bell reports the secretary had a blunt message of her own.

MATTHEW BELL: Hundreds of thousands of Pakistanis have led the fighting in South Waziristan. The Pakistani army launched an offensive against Taliban militants there almost two weeks ago. The BBC World Service spoke to people fleeing the violence and asked them who they thought was responsible. This man was not alone in directing his frustration toward the United States.

MAN: [SPEAKING URDU]

BELL: He said the solution will come when the US leaves Afghanistan. Then the turmoil in Pakistan will end.

It’s the kind of criticism Hilary Clinton heard a lot of in Pakistan this week. In an interview with the BBC Clinton said her overall mission was aimed at helping to overcome mistrust.

HILARY CLINTON: I don’t doubt that what we’ve been told here in Pakistan, over and over again, that there exists a trust deficit, is a challenge to the kind of relationship that President Obama and I believe is both possible and necessary with Pakistan. But it is also clear; as I have stated both publicly and privately, that we have questions that we are also seeking answers for.

BELL: Clinton might have been hinting at Washington’s most pressing concern yesterday when she suggested that Pakistan’s government is turning a blind eye to al-Qaeda leaders hiding in Pakistan.

MARVIN WEINBAUM: It’s like saying you’re part of our enemy.

BELL: Marvin Weinbaum is a Pakistan expert at the Washington-based Middle East Institute. He says Clinton’s comments about al-Qaeda were the diplomatic low point of her trip.

WEINBAUM: It’s a very serious accusation and it’s one thing to have feelings about this or even to suggest in private that we have some evidence of where they didn’t go after al-Qaeda cells where they might have. But to make it in the public fashion that she did I think was counterproductive.

BELL: On the whole though, Weinbaum says Clinton’s first visit to Pakistan as secretary of state was a good start. He says most high level US officials only stay in the country a few hours and meet a handful of power brokers. Weinbaum applauds Clinton for getting out and about and interacting with different kinds of people. And he says the trip didn’t come a moment too soon for a troubled relationship.

WEINBAUM: Yeah it is an uphill battle. And it’s not going to be solved by any one thing that we do. But a lot of it is optics. It’s the way which they see the United States and what our intentions are.

BELL: But that’s really only part of the problem.

TERRISITA SCHAFFER: The United States and Pakistan have objectives in the region that overlap but are not the same.

BELL: Terrisita Schaffer is a South Asia expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.

SCHAFFER: Pakistan’s long-term frustration – and this goes back nearly 50 years – is that for all their close relations with the United States the United States has never really been their ally against India which is what they still look on as the primary threat. From the US perspective we have a primary concern and that is the operation in which our troops are engaged in Afghanistan.

BELL: In interview after interview this week Hilary Clinton praised Pakistan for launching the military offensive in South Waziristan but the so-called Pakistani Taliban based there are primarily a threat to Pakistan’s government. They’re different from the Afghan Taliban. That group is thought to be based in other parts of Pakistan’s border region where they plan and carryout attacks over the border in Afghanistan. For The World I’m Matthew Bell.

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