The United States called Pakistan Friday to take action within “days and weeks” on dismantling Afghan militant havens and encouraging the Taliban into peace talks in order to end 10 years of war. Crucially Secretary of State Hillary Clinton appeared to extract recognition from Pakistan that it could do more in clamping down on Afghan insurgents using Pakistani soil to attack Americans but it offered no details on how. The top US diplomat spent Friday locked in talks with Pakistani leaders following a four-hour session late Thursday in neighbouring Afghanistan designed to quicken an end to one of America's longest wars. Unusually accompanied by CIA director David Petraeus and the top US military officer General Martin Dempsey, she said Islamabad has a “critical role in supporting Afghanistan reconciliation and ending the conflict”. “We look to Pakistan to take strong steps to deny Afghan insurgents safe havens and to encourage the Taliban to enter negotiations in good faith,” said Clinton after talks with Pakistani Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar. The United States was looking for operational action over “not months and years, but days and weeks because we have a lot of work to do to realise our shared goals,” emphasised Clinton. Relations between Pakistan and the United States deteriorated dramatically over the May 2 American special forces raid that killed Osama bin Laden near Islamabad and US accusations over the September 13 US embassy siege in Kabul. Pakistan's foreign minister, who attended four hours of talks Thursday involving military, intelligence and civilian leaders from both sides, appeared to give a commitment to do more. “Do safe havens exist? Yes, they do exist both sides. Do we need to cooperate? Yes. We can cooperate more and achieve better results,” said Khar.
