The United States on Friday said it does not support declaring Pakistan a "terrorist state" but will continue to work with the governments in the region to eliminate safe havens of terrorists which also pose a threat to the region. The US also called for a "meaningful dialogue" between India and Pakistan to address differences including the Kashmir issue and to bring down the recent tensions.
Asked if the government would support a bill in the Congress and an online petition that the US should declare Pakistan a "terrorist state", State Department spokesperson John Kirby at his daily press briefing said, "I have not seen anything specifically about the bill, and obviously we don't."
He, however, said he would not comment on "whatever pending legislation may be coming in that regard". "What I would say is common threat, common challenge in the region, and we're going to continue to work with Pakistan, with Afghanistan, and the Secretary of State just came back from Brussels and the Afghanistan conference in Brussels. And obviously it's a threat to the Indian people as well," he said.
"So we are going to continue to work with the governments in the region to try to address these common threats and challenges, and we have always said that more can be done about the safe havens and that's - we're going to, again, try to work as co-operatively as we can to that end," Kirby said. Kirby, however, expressed confidence that Pakistan has kept nuclear arsenals safe from terrorists.
He said the US position on Kashmir has not changed and it is for India and Pakistan to address the problem. "On the Kashmir issue, our position has not changed. We want this to be worked out between both sides, the issue of Kashmir. And generally, we obviously want to see the tensions that exist right now be brought down and for dialogue to take its place - meaningful dialogue to try to address these issues bilaterally between the countries," Kirby said. He added that the US wanted India and Pakistan to resolve their differences.
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