FATA affairs should be part of Pak's politics : Holbrooke

Washington, May 18 (ANI): US Special Envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan Richard Holbrooke has said that Pakistan should incorporate the affairs of the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) into the full political life of the country as a confidence building measure.

"Many of us believe that one thing that should be done is to take the Federally Administered Tribal Area and incorporate them into the full political life of Pakistan," Holbrooke said.

Hoolbrooke's view was endorsed by Senator John Kerry and senior State Department official Richard Boucher, the Dawn reports.

Commenting on Hoolbrooke's proposal, Boucher said Washington is persuading Pakistan to do what it has never been done in the past.

"We're trying to get them (Pakistan) to do the very thing that they've never been willing to do and no one's been able to do," Boucher said.

Boucher said the decision in this regard should be made Pakistan itself without any international pressure.

"It has to be a Pakistani decision made through an internal political process,and not under coercion or international pressure," he said.

Concerns about FATA's future have increased tremendously in Washington in the recent past, as the topic is discussed regularly at various think-tanks and newspaper columns.

The United States has avoided talking about a military operation in the region, and wants that all the political parties of Pakistan to launch the process for integrating FATA with the rest of the country.

Commenting on the issue Senator John Kerry recalled that FATA was created by the British in acknowledgement of the complications of the Pashtun and tribal presence there.

"The present border of approximately 1,500 miles between Afghanistan and Pakistan was agreed upon in a treaty signed on Nov. 12 1893, in Kabul by Sir Mortimer Durand, representing British India, and Abd al-Rahman, emir of Afghanistan," Kerry informed. (ANI)