Search the Internet          Tips

Pallone's recipe for capturing Osama Bin Laden

Arthur J. Pais

Want to capture Osama bin Laden?

Representative Frank Pallone Jr (Dem) has some suggestions. Impose sanctions against Pakistan on one hand, and on the other give it incentives to end its backing for the Taleban.

In a letter to President Bush, Pallone also praised Bush for "taking steps towards creating a strong, strategic partnership between US and India." He did not elaborate on the steps, though.

"A friendly India will help US security and geopolitical interests in the region against a belligerent Afghanistan, and an increasingly competitive China," Pallone, a New Jersey Democrat noted.

Pallone is a cofounder of the Congressional Caucus on India and Indian Americans.

Urging America to back Russian efforts in the Security Council to impose sanctions against Islamabad, Pallone noted: "I also believe that the US should urge Pakistan to disengage and officially withdraw its recognition of the Taleban as Afghanistan's ruling government."

Pallone continued: "Urging Pakistan to take away the official ambassadorial contacts from Kabul, as we have done, will help isolate the Taleban, thereby increasing our chances of capturing Osama bin Laden. "

Specific sanctions against Pakistan "will help pressure the government to withdraw its varied support to an increasingly oppressive Taleban," he asserted.

But he also urged the administration to consider giving incentives to Pakistan to back away from Taleban.

The sanctions would act as a wake-up call to Pakistan that it only hurts itself assisting the Taleban since the ethnic groups expelled by Taleban end up as refugees in Pakistan, Pallone reasoned. He said the refugee problem was one of the worst problems Pakistan was facing.

"We must act at this crucial hour before the situation becomes a security and human rights nightmare," he warned.

The incentives will give Islamabad a reason to cut off links with the extremist government in Afghanistan.

"An economic aid package and a group of ready investors in Pakistan's struggling economy, conditional upon the retraction of official and unofficial support to the Taleban might help in persuading Pakistan," he noted.

Back to top

Tell us what you think of this report