September 01, 2008	Monday	Sha'aban 29, 1429

NEW YORK, Aug 31: US officials were wary about PPP leader Asif Zardari’s mental problems in view of his imminent election as the president of Pakistan, said the Newsweek on Sunday and quoted a ranking Republican as saying that “typically the US wouldn’t want that kind of person” involved in a nuclear chain of command.

Noting that Mr Zardari’s elevation would give him “at least partial sway,” over the country’s nuclear arsenal, the magazine noted that while Mr Zardari’s spokespeople said he had been cured, multiple US officials, among them Rep Pete Hoekstra, the ranking Republican on the House Intelligence Committee,told Newsweek that word of Mr Zardari’s mental-health history took them by surprise.

“Typically,” said Mr Hoekstra, “[The US] wouldn’t want that kind of person” involved in a nuclear chain of command.

Mr Hoekstra told the magazine he did not recall being briefed about Zardari’s claims of mental incapacity; two other US foreign policy officials said they found the revelations surprising and disquieting. But a US official familiar with intelligence, who also asked for anonymity, said: “No one here should think information was deliberately withheld or suppressed,” the official said.