US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton gestures as she answers a question at a “townterview” in Islamabad on Friday. – Photo by AFP

ISLAMABAD: US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Friday admitted the United States held one exploratory meeting with the Haqqani network, which an official said took place before a series of massive attacks.

“In fact, the Pakistani government officials helped to facilitate such a meeting,” Clinton told a roundtable with Pakistani television journalists watched by the US travelling media.

A US official said Pakistan's main spy Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) directorate had arranged for the meeting with the militants that took place “in the summer,” before two symbolic anti-American attacks in Afghanistan.

Clinton said that “we do not see any contradiction” between fighting and talking.

“And we want more coordination between the United States, Pakistan and Afghanistan for what must be, with respect to the conflict, an Afghan-led effort,” the chief US diplomat said.

“We believe that there is now an opportunity for us to begin talking, but there is no guarantee that the talking will result in anything that will move us toward a peaceful resolution,” Clinton said.