WASHINGTON'In a day of intense diplomatic efforts that increasingly focused on Osama bin Laden, the Bush administration presented Pakistan with a detailed list of demands to help track the Saudi-born militant.
The United States received a broad promise of 'unstinted cooperation' from Pakistan and expects a quick response to the detailed list. According to diplomatic sources and administration officials, the requests include:
- Access to and assistance from Pakistani intelligence.
- Help in identifying the vast array of networks and agents worldwide sponsored by bin Laden's Al Qaeda organization.
- Tracking and closing off its financial assets and supply lines and cutting off fuel.
- Closing off the nation's border with Afghanistan and all militant Islamic schools and camps in Pakistan.
- Help with whatever retaliatory action the United States decides to take, including access to Pakistani airspace and logistical support. The United States interprets that demand to include deployment of American troops to Pakistan.
A diplomat from South Asia conceded that Pakistan may have difficulty with some of these requests.
'We have concerns about the possible backlash to some of these requests,' the diplomat said.
Thursday, a senior State Department official noted, 'In some ways, we're asking the same things of Pakistan as we're asking of everyone else'information, cutting off access and ending their ability to operate.'
The State Department delivered the list to Pakistani Ambassador Maleecha Lodhi after Secretary of State Colin Powell held a 10-minute telephone conversation with the South Asian nation's president, Pervez Musharraf.
'I wish to assure President Bush and the U.S. government of our unstinted cooperation in the fight against terrorism,' Musharraf said in a subsequent statement.
Earlier in Islamabad, the Pakistani capital, an adviser and spokesman for Musharraf said the close consultations carried out by the Bush administration so far, and the feeling of horror left by the terrorists' assault on innocent civilians, makes Pakistanis much more willing to accept a well-explained U.S. military strike.
