US assured Pakistan of no more unilateral action inside Pakistan:Gilani
BEIJING, May 19 (APP): Prime Minister Syed Yusuf Raza Gilani on Thursday said the United States had assured Pakistan of no more unilateral action inside its territory and only joint operations would be conducted in this regard. At an extensive interactive session here at the Peking University with the students, the Prime Minister said, “if there is any information about a High Value Target, that information needs to be shared and there will be a joint operation.” He said even as of today, talks were in progress with senior US administration officials over the issue.
Prime Minister Gilani noted the concern of the students of Peking University over the violation of Pakistan’s sovereignty and said his government had condemned the US military operation in Abbottabad.
“We take it as a violation of Pakistan’s sovereignty,” he said and also mentioned the unanimous resolution passed by the Parliament in this regard. Gilani said Pakistan was a responsible nuclear state and condemned all types of violation of its sovereignty.
He said Pakistan also condemns the drone strikes inside its territory and said it has repeatedly poited out that these were counter-productive. He said whenever a child or innocent people are killed in drone strikes, their realtives react violently and can be swayed to carry out acts of extremism and terrorism.
Prime Minister Gilani was appreciative of the role of China and said it was the first country to have extended full support to Pakistan in a difficult hour.
He said the acts of extremism and terrorism were not confined to Pakistan alone and it was not possible for any single country to act against these incidents on its own.
“No country can fight extremism or terrorism and stabilise Afghanistan without the help of Pakistan,” he said.
He said Pakistan was part of the solution and without its assistance there can be no peace and stability in the region.
He said Pakistan was in a unique position and has a border that passes through a difficult terrain with Afghanistan.
He said Pakistan was still providing assistance to 3.5 million Afghan refugees on its soil. He said Pakistan has rendered huge sacrifices and mentioned the deaths of around 30,000 civilians and 5,000 military personnel, besides injury to an equal number of people.
Gilani said Osama bin Laden was a foreign terrorist and has damaged Pakistan a lot. He said the world must recognise the sacrifices of Pakistan, like China has done.
To a question by a young Chinese girl student, he assured that more Chinese students, studying Pakistan Studies, would be invited to Pakistan.
He directed Ambassador Masood Khan to specially invite the young student and said she would be the special guest of Prime Minister Gilani and his family.