Washington, Mar 8(ANI): In an article for The Newsweek magazine, Selig Harrison, director of the Asia Program at the Center for International Policy and a senior scholar at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, has said that the Obama administration needs to shore up its support for beleaguered Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari.
Suggesting the need for easing internal tensions between Zardari and the Pakistani Army on the one hand, and improving ties with India by working out their differences on key issues, Harrison has recommended four steps that need to be taken.
He believes the U.S. should encourage India and Pakistan to give greater autonomy to Kashmiris under their respective jurisdictions, and promote intra-Kashmir trade as part of the growing India-Pakistan economic cooperation that Zardari advocates.
Harrison further recommends that the U.S. should also reject the Pakistani Army's attempt to use the absence of Kashmir negotiations as an excuse for supporting the Taliban.
"Parties must recognize that defusing Kashmir will take time, because it involves much more than a dispute over territory," Harrison said.
He also stressed that New Delhi should lift non-tariff procedural barriers that block Pakistani exports of textile products and raw cotton, thus necessitating costly imports.
Harrison says Zardari is cornered on two-fronts extremists taking advantage of economic unrest in Pakistan and hardliners who argue that opening up trade would lead to economic domination by India.
He, however, believes that Zardari has demonstrated surprising courage and consistency in seeking to downgrade the Kashmir issue and to jump-start economic cooperation with India, starting with liberalized trade, as the key to stabilizing Pakistan. (ANI)
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