US democracy-related law no longer
applicable to Pakistan: FO
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan says that instead of yearly certification by the US president, the democracy-related law, which imposes sanctions, should be abrogated altogether.
Spokesman at the Foreign Office Masood Khan said this while responding to a query on implications for Pakistan in which President Bush had signed a yearly certification, lifting democracy-related sanctions on Islamabad.
Addressing a press conference, the spokesman said that since democracy had already returned to Pakistan, this law could no longer be applied on it. Responding to a query about US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld comments on Pakistan’s involvement in nuclear proliferation, he said that investigations were still continuing.
He added that so far it had been revealed that no high-level military official had been involved and the proliferation network had been neutralised.
The spokesman said that there had been no request so far, official or otherwise, by the IAEA to inspect Pakistan’s nuclear installations. He said that since Pakistan was not a member of the NPT club it was under no obligation to do so. But he emphasised thatPakistan was cooperating with the IAEA because it was a member of this organisation and also because it was on the board of governors.
When Pakistan’s mission had contacted the IAEA spokesperson, she said that she had already sent a clarification to the concerned reporter and denied that there had been such a request.
Responding to a query on Vajpayee’s recent statement, the spokesman said that Pakistan agreed with Vajpayee that peace cannot be one sided. He said that the two foreign secretaries would be meeting soon, which would give the process its own momentum.
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