New Delhi: Taking a dig at Prime Minister Narendra Modi after 26/11 attacks mastermind Hafiz Saeed’s house arrest ended and passage of a US bill that requires Islamabad to help de-link the Lashkar-e-Taiba from the Haqqani Network, Rahul in a tweet on Saturday said Modi’s “hug-plomacy” has failed. “Narendrabhai, बात नहीं बनी. Terror mastermind is free. President Trump just delinked Pak military funding from LeT. Hugplomacy fail. More hugs urgently needed,” read the tweet.
Earlier, when the Indian Prime Minister had met Donald Trump at the White House in June, he gave the US President three hugs, prompting a renowned news agency to devote a news story to that display of bonhomie.
Rahul’s tweet contains a link to a news report on the National Defence Authorisation Act (NDAA) 2018.
The Pakistani newspaper Dawn says the bill “provides $700 million for reimbursing Pakistan for monitoring the Pak-Afghan border but withholds half of the amount.”
What’s more, the US government can’t issue a US $350 million waiver unless the American defense secretary “certifies to the congressional defence committees” that Pakistan is taking steps to deny the Haqqani network safe havens, curb the movement of its militants, disrupt its “fundraising and recruiting efforts,” and detain its leaders and initiate legal proeedings aginst them, Dawn’s report said.
“Policy makers in Washington feel that linking an India-specific group like LeT with the Haqqani Network could discourage Pakistan from cooperating with the US in the war in Afghanistan,” it said.
Last month, when Donald Trump tweeted that he’d begun to “develop a much better relationship with Pakistan and its leaders,” Rahul tweeted: “Modi ji quick; looks like President Trump needs another hug.”
