US had told Kayani: Stop backing groups like Lashkar

New Delhi: US cables from Pakistan, that NDTV is reporting on in collaboration with WikiLeaks, the Hindu and the Dawn, reveal how the US had told Pakistan's Army chief General Ashfaq Kayani that he must stop supporting terror groups.

A cable sent by Anne Patterson, then US Ambassador, to Washington sets the stage for General Kayani's visit to the US starting February 19, 2009. Patterson says, "US needs to lay down a clear marker that Pakistan's army/ISI must stop overt or tacit support for militant proxies such as the Haqqani network, commander Nazir and Lashkar-e-Taiba." (Read: Pakistan cable on Kayani visit to Washington)

She emphasises that the "single-biggest message Kayani should hear in Washington is that this support must end. It is now counterproductive to Pakistan's own interests and directly conflicts with USG objectives in Afghanistan--where Haqqani is killing American soldiers and Afghan civilians--and the region--where Mumbai exposed the fruits of previous ISI policy to create Lashkar-e-Taiba and still threatens potential conflict between nuclear powers."

Patterson notes in the cable that while President Zardari and Prime Minister Gilani agree that Pakistan's biggest threat comes from a growing militant insurgency on the Pak-Afghan border, "the military and ISI have not yet made that leap; they still view India as their principle threat and Afghanistan as strategic depth in a possible conflict with India. They continue to provide overt or tacit support for proxy forces (including the Haqqani group, Commander Nazir, Gulbaddin Hekmatyar, and Lashkar-e-Taiba) as a foreign policy tool."

(As part of a special arrangement that NDTV has come to with WikiLeaks, we will be reporting on cables dispatched by American diplomats who were posted in Pakistan. We shall do this along with the DAWN of Pakistan and the Indian daily The Hindu. All the cables will be posted on NDTV.com as we report on them and can be read here.)