United States special envoy Marc Grossman on Thursday met Pakistan's top civil and military leadership as part of efforts to salvage bilateral relations following the covert American operation in Abbottabad that killed Osama bin Laden.
Richard Holbrooke, the Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, on Tuesday scrupulously eschewed commenting on what the US can do to urge India to ease its tensions with Pakistan to help alleviate the Pakistani military's 'obsession' with India and hence be a catalyst in promoting President Barack Obama's Afghanistan-Pakistan strategy.
The Obama administration is apparently committed to alleviating India-Pakistan tensions and consequently influencing the Pakistani army to focus on the internal terrorist threat from the Al-Qaeda and the Taliban and not India, in order to advance Washington's AfPak agenda.
Richard Holbrooke, the United States Special Representative to Afghanistan and Pakistan, has asserted that the Obama administration "believes that what happens in Afghanistan and Pakistan is of vital interest to our national security and that India is a country that we must keep in the closest consultations with."
Beijing's growing assertiveness as kingmaker in Kabul has suffered a setback with Washington quietly moving in, observes Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
United States President Barack Obama has appointed Bruce Riedel, a veteran Central Investigative Agency analyst for nearly three decades, to chair an inter-agency policy review of US policy toward Afghanistan and Pakistan.Obama's press spokesman Robert Gibbs said that this policy review chaired by Riedel would have to be completed before the summit of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation in April.
India has fleshed out its approach toward the peace talks with the Taliban taking into account the inputs from John Kerry's visit as well as the consultations in Delhi the US special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan James Dobbins, says M K Bhadrakumar.
Continuation of drone strikes and US's reluctance to tender an apology over the killing of 24 Pakistani soldiers proved to be stumbling blocks in the talks between United States and Pakistan, reports Tahir Ali
Following the SGM in Ahmedabad, BCCI secretary Jay Shah said the World Cup schedule is expected to be announced during the WTC Final.
The court was considering the petition of the NCB seeking the custody of Pakistan national accused Zubair Derakshshandeh for five days from today.
The invitation for the meeting to India was extended by Qatari special envoy for conflict resolution Mutlaq bin Majed Al-Qahtani during his visit to the national capital last week.
The Obama administration is "disturbed" by the release of Jamaat-ud-Daawa chief Hafiz Mohammad Saeed, who was placed under house arrest nearly six months ago in the wake of the Mumbai attacks, US Special Representative Richard Holbrooke said on Wednesday.
The United States at this point of time is not in a position to certify that there is no link between the Pakistan's spy agency Inter-Services Intelligence and the dreaded Haqqani network, a senior top American official has said.
US Special Representative for Pakistan and Afghanistan Richard Holbrooke has promised "accountability" and "transparency" in America's civilian aid to Pakistan, a fortnight after a top Senator had expressed serious concern that the funds might end up in bank accounts of corrupt politicians and officials of the country.
Richard Holbrooke, US Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, who died on Monday at age 69, throughout his tenure in the Obama administration, scrupulously eschewed using the 'K' word despite constantly being baited by South Asian journalists and even US lawmakers after it was first rumoured that he would be President Obama's trouble-shooter for the subcontinent.
Musharraf will have to strain every nerve to gain political traction in Pakistan
'He has about as much chance of coming back to power as (former Soviet) President (Mikhail) Gorbachev,' The News quoted Richard Holbrooke, US administration's Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, as saying to a gathering of American diplomats and security experts.
Pakistan said it would approach the upcoming foreign secretary-level talks with India with an "open mind" in the interest of normalising bilateral relations though "the vibes emanating from the other side have not been encouraging".
It is a tribute to a system so robustly meritocratic that this team represents India's diversity better than any other institution: The Union Cabinet, our chief ministers, the civil services, the leadership of our armed forces and security agencies, the judiciary and more than all of these, our typical newsroom. That is the biggest message from this breathless rise of Indian cricket, asserts Shekhar Gupta.
Senior United States administration sources have dismissed speculation raised in some media reports that Richard Holbrooke, US Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, had cancelled his visit to India this time around because he avoided getting caught up in the controversy over the opposition attacks on the India-Pakistan joint statement announced in Sharm-el-Sheikh, Egypt
With the rapid expansion of India-US ties, which are expected to deepen in the coming years, it is time to upgrade the India desk at the South and Central Asia Bureau of the State Department to a full fledged India Office, an official report has said.
The appointment of veteran diplomat Peter Burleigh as charge d'affaires at the American embassy in New Delhi was a Department decision and not on the recommendation of Richard Holbrooke, Special Representative to Afghanistan and Pakistan, as had been rumored because of their earlier longtime working relationship, senior Administration sources have told rediff.com.
The Taliban had promised an 'inclusive' government that represents Afghanistan's complex ethnic makeup, but there is no Hazara member in the cabinet.
On the eve of US Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan Richard Holbrooke's visit to the South Asia, The Guardian newspaper has said Pakistan is the greatest foreign policy challenge for the Barack Obama administration.
US special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, Richard Holbrooke has said that the aid being given to Pakistan in the aftermath of the flash floods is inadequate.
Amid concerns by certain quarters in Pakistan over the 'strings' attached to the United States aid, Washington on Friday asserted that no condition has been imposed on Pakistan for the $ 680 Defense Authorisation Bill and charged that an attempt is on to 'willfully distort' the facts.
The Pakistan government is reported to have raised the issue of its agrarian lands drying up due to India's water conspiracy with visiting United States Special Representative to Pakistan and Afghanistan Richard Holbrooke.
Frank Ruggiero, a career civil servant who served under late United States diplomat Richard Holbrooke, has been made the acting US special representative to the Af-Pak region and will be assisted by two deputies, one of them an Indian-American named Vikram Singh.
There is no better way to address the security threat emanating from ISIS and other terrorist groups in Afghanistan than by co-opting the Taliban, asserts Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
Suspicious of deepening ties between India and the United States, Pakistan is reluctant to plunge into war with Afghan militants and even high-profile visits of US officials have failed to win over a military and civilian establishment in Islamabad, a media report said.
Pakistani Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi has met top US officials to discuss the Barack Obama Administration's review of the Afghan policy.
Expressing concern over the release of A Q Khan from house arrest, the United States told Pakistan that the disgraced nuclear scientist continues to be a "serious threat" to proliferation of nuclear weapons technology. US Special Representative for Pakistan and Afghanistan Richard Holbrooke, who is currently on a visit to Islamabad, certainly raised the issue pertaining to A Q Khan, State Department spokesperson Robert Wood said on Wednesday.
Terming United States Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's forthcoming visit to Pakistan as a 'people-to-people trip', Obama administration's Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, Richard Holbrooke has said that Clinton's trip to the troubled nation would be one the most important foreign visits of the top American diplomat.
United States Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan Richard Holbrooke on Wednesday said that Pakistani leaders brought up the issue of India's alleged involvement in Balochistan, but did not give any credible evidence to support their claim.
India, Pakistan and the United States were facing the shared challenge of combating terrorism, a top American official said on Wednesday as he pressed Islamabad to 'move forward' from the 'complicated history' with New Delhi to take on the 'common enemy.'
The terror group is in touch with the international community and intra-Afghan parties to make government in Afghanistan.
The Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari has acknowledged that the Taliban, with whom his government reached a truce deal in the restive Swat valley days ago, are "murderous thugs and militants" who "pose a danger to Pakistan, the United States and India".
The Indian side expressed readiness to provide extensive humanitarian assistance to Afghanistan, Mujahid was quoted as saying by Afghanistan's Tolo News.
Holbrooke declared before the House Foreign Affairs Committee on Tuesday, "We do not think that Pakistan is a failed State. We think it's a State under extreme test from the enemies who are also our enemies and who have the same common enemy -- the United States and Pakistan. It just isn't (a failed State). But it is a State under enormous social, political and economic pressure. And India is always a factor."
The 2022 World Cup in Qatar has been beset by controversy, but for the visionaries bringing soccer back to life in Afghanistan it represents a shining, magical light at the end of a very long and dark tunnel.
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