US-Pak Ties Worsen As Imran Khan, Trump Engage in War of Words

“We paid Pakistan Billions of Dollars and they never told us Bin Laden was living there. Fools!..,” tweeted Trump.

In addition to economic losses, the prime minister highlighted the impact of the US war on Pakistan’s tribal areas.

(Photo: Erum Gour/The Quint)

Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan Monday, 19 November, reacted sharply to US President Donald Trump's latest tirade against Islamabad for not doing "a damn thing" for America in curbing terrorism, saying the US, instead of making Pakistan a "scapegoat" for its failures in Afghanistan, should find out why the Taliban has emerged stronger than before.

Khan's tweets came a day after President Trump defended his administration's decision to stop hundreds of millions of dollars in military aid to Pakistan for not doing enough to curb terrorism and criticised Islamabad for offering a hideout to Al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden in the garrison city of Abbottabad.

"Instead of making Pakistan a scapegoat for their failures, the US should do a serious assessment of why, despite 140,000 Nato troops, plus 250,000 Afghan troops and reportedly USD 1 trillion spent on the war in Afghanistan, the Taliban today are stronger than before," he suggested.

In addition to economic losses, the prime minister highlighted the impact of the US war on Pakistan's tribal areas.

Trump Hits Back, Again

Continuing his tirade against Pakistan, President Donald Trump on Monday said the US has paid Islamabad billions of dollars but it never told the Americans that the Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden was living in that country.

"We paid Pakistan Billions of Dollars and they never told us he was living there. Fools!..," Trump said in a tweet, a day after he told Fox News in an interview that Laden should have been captured long before.

Background

The ties between the two countries strained after Trump, while announcing his Afghanistan and South Asia policy in August last year, hit out at Pakistan for providing safe havens to "agents of chaos" that kill Americans in Afghanistan and warned Islamabad that it has "much to lose" by harbouring terrorists.

In September, the Trump administration cancelled USD 300 million in military aid to Islamabad for not doing enough against terror groups like the Haqqani Network and Taliban active on its soil.