WASHINGTON, Feb 26: Democratic frontrunner Hillary Clinton has said that if elected president of the United States later this year, she will base her foreign policy on democratic yearnings expressed by the Pakistani people in the Feb 18 elections.
In a foreign policy speech at Washington’s George Washington University, Senator Clinton said her policy will also recognise that the border areas between Pakistan and Afghanistan are among the most important and dangerous in the world.
“Ignoring these realities of what is happening on the ground in both Afghanistan and Pakistan has been one of the most dangerous failures of the Bush foreign policy,” she said.
“The clearest example of that is what just happened in Pakistan. The Pakistani people essentially repudiated the Bush administration’s policies and created a new dynamic that could lead to greater freedoms and democracy or to a greater crisis with implications for the war in Afghanistan.”
In a veiled reference to her Democratic rival Senator Barack Obama’s earlier speech in which he spoke of invading Pakistan to destroy suspected terrorist hideouts, Mrs Clinton said: “One thing the American people can be sure of, I will not broadcast threats of unilateral military action against a country like Pakistan just to demonstrate that I am tough enough for the job.” Emphasising the need for changing Washington’s approach to Pakistan, Senator Clinton said: “We have to change our tone and change our course.”
The Democratic presidential hopeful recalled that when she returned from a visit to Pakistan and Afghanistan last January, she urged the White House to send a high-level presidential envoy to the region.
“I said there is a lot of misunderstanding between President Musharraf and President Karzai and it is going to cause us problems,” said Mrs Clinton while explaining why she wanted President Bush to send a special envoy. Instead of accepting her proposal, Mrs Clinton noted, the White House continued to provide full support for President Musharraf as he moved further and further away from democracy, as his strategy for battling Al Qaeda, the Taliban and other extremists proved time and time again to be inadequate.
“We have a new opportunity now. We need to be supporting those in Pakistan from the middle class, from the professions who are our natural allies in order to give American approval to the changes that have taken place in the elections,” she said.
“The more we have people invested in their own futures, the more likely they are to work with us to protect our future. That is what I will attempt to do.”
Senator Clinton said it was not enough for America to commit itself to helping the people of Pakistan realise their democratic aspirations. “It is also important that we revive our commitment at a very public level to human rights and individual freedom.”
Referring to media reports that US interrogators have tortured Taliban and Al Qaeda suspects at the Guantanamo Bay prison camp in Cuba, Mrs Clinton said: Let’s make it clear that we will never sanction torture and we will stand for the rule of law.”
The United States, she said, needs to build a real coalition of allies to defeat terrorists in Afghanistan and other countries that provide a safe haven for Al Qaeda.
“Let’s make it clear that any terrorists who attack the United States, who have safe haven in any country, are putting that country at risk. That is one way for us to demonstrate that we will not be the aggressor, we will not engage in pre-emptive attacks, but we will defend our nation.”