Pakistan sets new rules for engagement

Editor's Note: The following report is excerpted from Joseph Farah's G2 Bulletin, the premium online newsletter published by the founder of WND. Subscriptions are $99 a year or, for monthly trials, just $9.95 per month for credit card users, and provide instant access for the complete reports.

WASHINGTON – Pakistan's parliament has set new guidelines which are to determine how the country conducts relations with the United States in the future.

The move includes parliament's approval of requests to reopen the Khyber Pass supply line which was closed earlier following the accidental killing of 24 Pakistani soldiers on the Afghan-Pakistani border last November, according to a report in Joseph Farah's G2 Bulletin.

However, it also has called for a halt in U.S. drone flights into Pakistan. Those flights not only kill Taliban and al-Qaida militants but have also had a record of killing civilians, an action which has outraged the Pakistani population.

The parliamentary guidelines do not link the two issues – namely, making a halt in the drone strikes a prerequisite to reopening the vital supply lines for U.S. and coalition troops of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.

However, there is no indication yet when those supply lines will be reopened, even though when they were open the Taliban subjected the vital supplies to constant attack, with little protection from Pakistani troops.

In addition, the parliamentary guidelines call for a halt of attacks or transport of arms – implying a reference to militants – into Afghanistan from Pakistani territory. However, that would mean Pakistani troops would have to go up against the very same militants that the Pakistani government created, and that also appears unlikely.

The guidelines also prohibit any overt or covert establishment of foreign bases in Pakistan and call for an unconditional apology from the United States for the Nov. 25-26 attack that killed the 24 Pakistani troops along the Afghan-Pakistani border.

The Pakistani government resorted to parliamentary approval to give it cover in seeking to re-establish U.S.-Pakistani relations, which are at an all-time low.

There have been initial indications from U.S. sources that the U.S. will decide when it will send drones into Pakistan and may consider an open apology for the killing of the Pakistani troops which the U.S. already said was a regrettable accident.

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