Pakistan warns US over attacks

Pakistani Foreign Secretary Salman Bashir

Source: Press TV
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/178500.html

Pakistan's Foreign Secretary Salman Bashir has warned the US that any further operations in the Asian country can have “devastating” consequences.

“We feel that that sort of misadventure or miscalculation would result in a terrible catastrophe. There should be no doubt Pakistan has adequate capacity to ensure its own defense,” Bashir said, referring to an unauthorized operation that killed al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden on May 2, a Press TV correspondent reported on Friday.

“Our radars were jammed and military leadership was not taken into confidence in the operation that killed bin Laden. Osama has become a thing of the past, but if these kinds of acts are repeated the results can be devastating,” Bashir added.

The official said Pakistan's armed forces are fully capable of defending the country, dismissing accusations that Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence has links with al-Qaeda.

Bashir also said people trust the capabilities of the Pakistani military in countering attacks on the country's territories.

Islamabad says the operation was without prior information or authorization from the government.

However, CIA director Leon Panetta has said he US did not inform Pakistani authorities about the raid since they feared Islamabad might disrupt the mission.

Former officials with Pakistan's military and intelligence service say the US wrongfully claims it has killed bin Laden in Pakistan as part of a scheme to invade the country for harboring the terrorist leader.

The US has also rejected growing arguments that the US military effort against bin Laden in Pakistan was illegal, describing the operation as “an act of national self-defense.”

US Attorney General Eric Holder told a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing that the killing of bin Laden was lawful and consistent with US values.

The reciprocal criticisms seem to have deepened tensions between Pakistan and the US, already at odds over the unauthorized US drone attacks that have killed hundreds of civilians in Pakistan over the past years.

The Pakistani government has come under fire at home after US intelligence contractor Raymond Davis, charged with the killing of two locals in Lahore in January, was set free after allegedly paying blood money to the family of the victims.

A recent report by the Washington Post says a team of US spies had been conducting extensive surveillance on bin Laden over a period of months from a CIA safe house in the town of Abbottabad, where the al-Qaeda leader was killed.