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Pakistan

Haqqani network designation no signal to Pakistan: Clinton

Dunya News

Secretary Clinton has said that designating Haqqani network is not a message to Pakistan.

The US Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, during an interview with Bloomberg News in Russia, has denied the impression that the decision to designate Haqqani network as a foreign terrorist organization was intend to send any signal to Pakistan. It’s part of the continuing effort to try to send a message to them (Haqqani network) – not to anybody else, but to them - because of the really incredibly damaging attacks that they have waged against us, against other targets, and inside Afghanistan, she stressed.When asked that the US already targets the Haqqanis for combat and drone operations, and also the assets of their sanction leaders, so what difference will this blacklist make, Secretary Clinton said that it is about squeezing them in the ways that now are available to us under the designation and the Executive Order.It gives us much greater reach into any financial assets or fundraising that they may engage in, gives us better traction against assets that they might own. So we think it adds to the pressure on the Haqqanis. And it’s important that we use every tool at our disposal to go after them, she explained while giving the rationale behind the decision in response to a Congressional legislation that was signed into law by President Obama, making it binding upon the Secretary of State within 30 days as to why Haqqani network should not be designated a terrorist organization.On another question that the Taliban who harbored al-Qaida in Afghanistan prior to the 9/11 attacks had never been blacklisted and whether there was any possibility to backlist Taliban as well, Secretary Clinton declined giving a clear answer. We do very intensive analysis before we designate someone as a foreign terrorist organization, and I think I’ll let the designation speak for itself. We have reached that conclusion about the Haqqani Network and we think it’s the right decision, she contended.On the nuclear negotiations with Iran that have come to a halt despite increasing noises out of Israel about a possible preemptive military strike, Secretary Clinton said that the US had maintained a steady course of a two-pronged policy. We have always said every option was on the table, but we believe in the negotiation, the diplomatic effort.We are (also) working to increase that pressure. The sanctions, we know, are having an effect. The efforts that the P-51 (negotiating group) have made to pin Iran down on what exactly they are willing to do are still underway, and we will be having some meetings in the next month in New York and elsewhere to take stock of where we are, she argued.I think it’s a very challenging effort to get them to move in a way that complies with their international obligations, but we believe that is still, by far, the best approach to take at this time, she opined while ruling out any deadlines in this regard. We’re not setting deadlines. We’re watching very carefully about what they do, because it’s always been more about their actions and their words, she maintained.- Contributed by Awais Saleem, Dunya News correspondent in Washington, DC