New Delhi: The US has faced the “consistent hard problem” that elements in official Pakistani organisations have connections with terrorist groups but such an approach will only lead to more difficulties for Islamabad, former president Barack Obama said on Friday.
During an hour-long interaction at the a Summit. Obama also said his administration had been able to find “no evidence” that the Pakistan government had been aware of al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden’s presence in the country.
Balancing ties with Pakistan was a key part of Obama’s two terms as president. The US conducted a record number of drone strikes under his watch that targeted Taliban and al-Qaeda leaders in Pakistan’s lawless northwest, and he ordered the operation by US Navy Seals that killed bin Laden in the garrison town of Abbottabad in May 2011.
Referring to the “tragedy in Mumbai”, Obama said the US was “as obsessed with how to dismantle that network as India was. In fact, our intelligence and military personnel were immediately deployed to work with the Indian government in any ways that the Indian government determined it would be helpful in getting this done.”