Pakistan's sacrifices in war on terror deserve respect
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The killing of Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden by US special forces in the garrison town Abbottabad, close to the capital of Islamabad, sparked global discussion over Pakistan's role in the action.
The US has started to revaluate its relations with Pakistan after the death of Bin Laden. The US Congress launched hearings on Pakistan and Afghanistan on May 5. The Pakistani military also held a special conference to assess the impact of the US mission.
The doubts the US harbors against Pakistan focus on two points: Whether Pakistan knew where Bin Laden was hiding and covered for him while he eluded capture for all these years, and whether to keep on cooperating with Pakistan in anti-terrorism.
The unilateral and successful mission to eliminate Bin Laden by the US demonstrated to some that the US could achieve its targets without help from Pakistan.
Leon Panetta, the CIA director, recently claimed that Pakistan could not be informed about the mission for fear that they might leak the information.
Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari argued in an article in the Washington Post that the US reproaches of Pakistan's initiative in anti-terrorism were groundless.
The US-Pakistan Defence Consultative Group said in a joint statement that the anti-terrorism operation aimed at Bin Laden indicated the importance of US-Pakistan cooperation.
The split opinions of the US and Pakistan reflected the ingrained distrust and severe disagreement on anti-terrorism strategies between them.
The unilateral action of the US in killing the terrorist mastermind has already placed Pakistan in a dilemma.
The Pakistani government was suspicious of sitting by while the US invaded their territory, air space and sovereignty, and feared that Pakistan might suffer from a round of reprisals from Al Qaeda if they admitted aiding the US.
But if they played no role, or if the mission truly had to be kept from them for fears of security leaks, the strategic conflicts between the two nations are utterly exposed.
General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, chief of staff of Pakistan's army, said in his statement after the special evaluation meeting that any further actions violating Pakistan's sovereignty will lead the government to re-evaluate its possible military and information cooperation with the US.
