President George W. Bush will meet with Pakistan's prime minister in Washington this month, Bush's press secretary Scott McClellan said on Wednesday. The July 29 visit by Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz "follows on the successful trip of Secretary Rice to Pakistan in March," McClellan said in a statement released in Copenhagen, where Bush was visiting.
Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice said she went to Pakistan and neighbouring India in March. After the visit, the Bush administration announced it was asking Congress to lift an embargo that had denied Pakistan two dozen F-16 warplanes it contracted for in the 1980s. The United States blocked the sale because of Pakistan's moves toward building nuclear weapons.
"The president looks forward to working with the Prime Minister to build on our shared long-term vision for US-Pakistan relations."
Pakistan is a crucial US ally in the US-led Afghanistan war and the wider campaign against terror.
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