News: US waiting for Indian poll results for more Af-Pak moves

WASHINGTON: One of the first calls India’s newly elected leadership will get next week will come from Washington, and it won’t stop at congratulations for winning the election. The Obama administration can hardly wait for a new government to take office in New Delhi to push ahead with its Af-Pak agenda in which it says India has a key role. At a Senate hearing on Wednesday, US’ Af-Pak envoy Richard Holbrooke acknowledged as much, telling a Senator who wanted to know how New Delhi could help arrest the deteriorating situation in the region that it is best he remained discreet for now because India was in the final days and hours of an election and "since any comment I would make, might be misunderstood in that context, I would rather just simply restrict myself to saying that my job is Afghanistan and Pakistan." Taken together with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s response to a similar question last week ("All in due time," she said when asked about India’s role), Washington is unmistakably waiting for a new dispensation in New Delhi before taking up the matter of how best India can help. The expectation in the US analysts’ community is that India will be requested to ease military deployment and re-start dialogue with Pakistan to enable Islamabad take on insurgency at home. However, in remarks that should assuage jumpy nationalists ever ready to see US pressure on India in every move, Holbrooke richly acknowledged New Delhi’s interest in Afghanistan and primacy in the region and said "at all steps in the process, we keep the Indians fully informed." "They are not only an interested party, they are arguably THE interested party although many other countries, including most notably China and Iran have borders with Afghanistan and have also interests," he said in remarks bound to create ripples in Islamabad and other capitals. "India’s interests are very high--India is the great regional power and I have great personal respect and affection for India," he added, telling lawmakers that "they (India) have a new ambassador (Meera Shankar) who just arrived and I met her as soon as she was in Washington, and we will keep India fully informed and the issues you raised are on great concern to us." "But, if you’ll permit me, I’d like to stop at that point,"he said, having cited the sensitivity of the ongoing election in India. Holbrooke’s remarks came amid considerable agitation from lawmakers at the Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing, where the administration’s move to rush a massive aid package to Pakistan into an unexpectedly strong headwind. Senators from both sides of the aisle showed greater skepticism about its proper use than state department mandarins, with one Senator going so far as to snippily observe he wanted to ensure the money doesn’t "end up in a bank account in Switzerland." The opposition, especially from Democrats, was unexpected because the administration was believed to have done the groundwork for a smooth passage with the support of the committee chairman John Kerry and the minority leader Richard Lugar. Kerry particularly has been a strong votary of aid without the stringent conditions that some other lawmakers are calling for. But there was dissent in the ranks on Tuesday, including from New Jersey’s Senator Robert Menendez, who raged against Washington plowing in more than $ 12 billion into Pakistan over the past decade with little to show for it. Accusing the Pakistan of a "one step forward, two steps backwards" policy, Menendez said they rushed their troops to the Indian border when their sovereignty is being besieged by the elements within their country. They also make a deal in the Swat region "which was not in their interests nor in ours." "You wonder whether the Pakistanis are on the same page as us or they are only there when, in fact, pressure is exerted in their own national interest as well as ours," Menendez said, telling Holbrooke that he was not going to sign off on the aid bill without any accountability or benchmarks. Holbrooke promised greater accountability, telling the committee that the Director of National Intelligence, former Admiral Dennis Blair is working out benchmarks with House and Senate committees. "We cannot walk away from Pakistan now without damaging our own vital national security interests," he cautioned, adding that the Kerry-Lugar aid bill now had a "talismanic quality" for Pakistanis and had become a symbol of American support for Pakistan in the emergency. "The only beneficiaries of a delay in this bill are the enemies of this nation," he warned. Menendez remained unconvinced, as was Senator Bob Corker, a Republican from Tennessee. "I would like to know how the money would be circulated in Pakistan and will not end in bank accounts in Switzerland," said Corker. "You’re asking us to vote for a whole new set of money without knowing whether there are going to be benchmarks, without knowing whether we have a better system of accountability. I personally can’t continue down that road, as much as I think this is critical," Menendez said, offering a private meeting to Holbrooke to explain the administration’s case. Holbrooke took up the offer, but the Senate resistance and the attendant delay came as a blow to the administration, which wanted to put some aid on the table for Pakistan after its attack in the Swat region displaced more than a million people and created a refugee crisis. A Pakistani delegation led by its President Asif Ali Zardari had already announced that a $ 1.9 billion aid package had been cleared, assuming that the administration would easily get it past a complaint Congress.   source - times