Increase font size Decrease font size Reset font size

Gains of US tour

2015-12-18
WASHINGTON: The visit of President Ayub Khan to Washington has been a marked political triumph for Pakistani`s soldier-statesman. This was the general consensus in the diplomatic circles here at the end of the crucial two-day meeting between President Johnson and President Ayub.

Mr Johnson`s Press Secretary Bill Moyers said that the `primary targets` of the Ayub-Johnson meeting `were political, not economic`. An astute display of political acumen and far sight combined with hard determination by President Ayub netted the following political results observers hold: One: The United States has recognised what President Ayub called Pakistan`s `geopolitical compulsion` that made it absolutely imperative that Pakistan maintain normal relations with Russia and China. Despite continued and deep suspicion of the United States about China`s socalled evil designs in Asia, President Johnson has accepted that Pakistan`s ties with China were not necessarily against Pakistan`s interest a sharp shift from his earlier stand that China was as much a threat to Pakistan as to India.

Two: The United States has accepted that Pakistan`s need for good relations with her neighbours ruled out any support, however `symbolic` or `token`, to US military action in Viet-Nam.

Three: Pakistan has received categorical assurances explicit in the communiqué that the United States would live by its commitment to ensure that the Sept 20 resolution of the Security Council was carried out in full.-Correspondent