Sir — This refers to the editorial, “Well begun’s half done” (January 3). The New Year brought a well-deserved jolt for Pakistan from US President Donald Trump. In his first tweet in the New Year, Trump wrote, “The United States has foolishly given Pakistan more than 33 billion dollars in aid over the last 15 years and they have given us nothing but lies and deceit, thinking of our leaders as fools. They give safe haven to the terrorists we hunt in Afghanistan with little help. No more!”
The US President has only spoken the truth about Pakistan. India has since a long time been emphasising that the US aid was being misused by Pakistan in helping financially and militarily anti-India terrorist groups operating on Pakistani soil. But there are contradictions among the US administration itself.
According to media reports, recently, the US Department of Defence put pressure on key Congressional committees to drop a provision linking financial aid to Pakistan with Islamabad, taking demonstrable action against the lashkar-e-Tayyeba (leT), insisting that curbing the Haqqani network must remain the top priority and adding leT was like “shifting the goal post for Pakistan”.
Such differentiation between terror groups is self-defeating. However, after Trump’s tough talk, suspension of $255 million military aid to Pakistan is a positive development for India.