Pakistan's prime minister said Thursday that the United States "martyred" al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, a term that reflected a subtle stab at Washington as it's mainly used for honorable figures slain in battle. Imran Khan delivered the stab in a rambling budget speech in parliament, attacking his predecessors' foreign policies and saying that Pakistan’s partnership with the United States in the war on terror was a mistake, the AP reports. Khan also said Washington used abusive language against Pakistan, blamed Islamabad for its failures in neighboring Afghanistan—and refused to tell Islamabad of its operation against bin Laden in 2011 before Navy SEALs carried out their nighttime raid.
"We sided with the US in the war on terror but they came here and killed him, martyred him and ... did not inform us (of the raid), despite the fact that we lost 70,000 people in war on terror," Khan told parliament. Washington has repeatedly accused Pakistan of harboring the Afghan Taliban and giving safe haven to the feared Haqqani network, a Taliban affiliate that has been blamed for some major attacks in Afghanistan. Pakistan denied the accusations, saying Washington was blaming Pakistan for the failure of the US-led coalition to defeat the Taliban, who are now at their strongest since being toppled in 2001. "The way we supported America in the war on terror, and the insults we had to face in return ... They blamed us for every failure in Afghanistan. They openly held us responsible because they did not succeed in Afghanistan," Khan said.
(More
Pakistan stories.)
,
uBlock 
,
and
Ghostery 
)
