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PAKISTAN HAS SUMMONED the US ambassador in response to a tweet US President Donald Trump sent in which he threatened to cut aid over “lies” about militancy.
In a rare public rebuke, Ambassador David Hale was asked to go to the foreign office in Islamabad last night – after the Pakistani capital responded angrily to Trump’s allegations that it provided safe havens for militants in the latest spat to rock their alliance.
A US embassy spokesman today confirmed Hale met officials, but added: “We don’t have any comment on the substance of the meeting.” There was no immediate response from foreign office officials.
Trump used his first tweet of 2018 to tear into Islamabad.
“The United States has foolishly given Pakistan more than 33 billion dollars in aid over the last 15 years, and they have given us nothing but lies & deceit, thinking of our leaders as fools,” Trump said in the early-morning New Year’s Day tweet.
“They give safe haven to the terrorists we hunt in Afghanistan, with little help. No more!”
Pakistan hit back swiftly, saying it had done much for the United States, helping it to “decimate” Al-Qaeda, while getting only “invective & mistrust” in return in angry comments from its foreign and defence ministers.
Islamabad has repeatedly denied the accusations of turning a blind eye to militancy, lambasting the US for ignoring the thousands who have been killed on its soil and the billions spent fighting extremists.
September 11th
After the September 11th terror attacks in the US in 2001, Washington forged a strategic alliance with Islamabad to help in its fight against militancy. However, US leaders have often complained that Pakistan – long accused by Washington and Kabul of supporting the Taliban – has done too little to help.
Of foremost concern is Islamabad’s attitude toward the powerful Haqqani network, whose leader Sirajuddin Haqqani is the deputy leader of the Afghan Taliban.
The group is accused of some of the most lethal attacks on US forces in Afghanistan, and was dubbed by America’s former top military officer Mike Mullen as a “veritable arm” of Pakistani intelligence.
For many years it found safe haven in Pakistan’s semi-autonomous northwestern tribal areas. However, the Pakistani military launched an operation there in 2014 and now insists it has eradicated all safe havens in the country.
US-Pakistani ties, long contentious, have taken a nosedive under Trump, who first signalled that Washington was reassessing the fractious relationship in August, when he accused Islamabad of harbouring “agents of chaos”.
The remarks triggered a series of high-level diplomatic meetings in the US and Pakistan, but Islamabad has given few signs of concessions.
The Trump administration told Congress in August it was weighing whether to withhold $255 million (about €212 million) in earmarked aid to Islamabad over its failure to crack down more effectively on terror groups in Pakistan.
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This means Irish people will be holidaying in Europe for the foreseeable future..
Stop it. People on here are too poor to holiday abroad.
I’m too poor to holiday in Ireland!
Staying in Ireland is bloody expensive.. Only last week I was checking out hotel prices in New York online , I put my dates in and when the hotels popped up I said to myself “Jasus that’s expensive” Then when I looked closely I realised I hadn’t changed my location from Dublin.. They were poxy hotel prices in Dublin I was looking at.. Then you factor in €5.50 pints, €15 for a burger and trying to entertain kids in the fecking rain for two weeks.. It’s nearly as cheap to go to New York..
Actually, it’s good If the Euro is weak and more will buy/spend here. Go to Portugal/Spain/Greece, If you need a holiday and Ireland is still way too expensive.
Crap for holidays of course, but brilliant for our export market, which is huge for Ireland
Is there ANYthing to be said for another mass?
By mass you mean quantitive easing and false inflation?
Another MASS EXODUS of immigration Joe lol.
This is generally good for Irish exports as are goods are relatively cheaper to buy, not so good for imports
Great for Irish exports though.
More American tourists will come as result, none of them fancied paying $10 for a pint!
If Yellan puts on interest rates for the dollar then that might effect U.S. business here and therefore jobs???
I was charged US$10 for a glass of californian wine in a restaurant in California last week AND had to pay 15% tip on top, bringing it to a grand total of US$11.50! Rubbish sandwich in the airport cost US$9.50 plus tax!
I think the Yanks will not be shocked by our prices and will be pleasantly surprised by the quality of our food!
I was in the USA a while back and the prices were off the wall. Couldn’t believe it. Makes here look cheap
The quality of our food?
What are you smokin’?
If your getting a good glass of California wine for 10 dollars it’s worth it. Your probably use to drinking €5 a bottle of Lidl’s best red water.
Oooooh we have a connoisseur here.
How many bogus accounts now I.G.T. green thumbing yourself multiple times .What a sad life.
Depends on the Dollar Euro strain, QE has created a mess and the U.S. tells Germany what to do and they tell Ireland what to do then, a f….g mess.
How low will it have to get before the plug is pulled?
Lower than a snakes bollix
Not too long now I fear and I do fear that…
https://www.rt.com/shows/sophieco/320457-eu-currency-economy-crises/
I love Russia Today, it gives me a nice warm sense of panic and paranoia.
Michael. The fall of threat Euro has been bandied about for the past 15 years and guess what its still here. And RT should really look at the Ruble and the Russian economy. Toilet Paper and flushing toilets spring to mind when they are mentioned.
When it collapses. None of these idiots would get rid of it till that happens.
Don’t go by them alone, listen to Bloonberg as well, the BBC, never put all your eggs in one basket. Look at Dragi now…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hans-Werner_Sinn
“President of the Ifo Institute for Economic Research and serves on the German economy ministry’s advisory council. He is Professor of Economics and Public Finance at the University of Munich” and that is who was saying that a political union was needed to save the Euro now on that RT programme.
https://www.rt.com/shows/sophieco/320457-eu-currency-economy-crises/
So it was him Sinn that did all the speaking and not RT BUT YOU DIDN’T WATCH IT DID YOU MICK?
I fear an Euro breakup that will make the Eurozone look like Germany after WW1… BECAUSE WHAT THEY NEED TO FIX THE eURO WILL BE A POLITICAL uNION AND MANY COUNTRIES WILL NOT ACCEPT THAT…
in good news 1 euro=14.8 South Africa Rands. so cape town and the garden route looks like a good holiday.
Why surprised ?! It’s exactly what the ECB wanted.
For those of you who think that FG/Lab should be commended for the “recovery”, I’d suggest you think very carefully about what this means.
The Euro will shortly be worth less than the currency of a federation that is renowned for not paying its debts.
The weak euro is working out quite nicely for Irish business, thank you very much.
Not that that had anything to do with FG, Labour etc though.
Joe,
What you call “Irish Business” is not beneficial to the Irish people.
The profits created by “Irish Business” would be an incredible boost to our economy if they stayed here. The truth is that “Irish Business” is essentially an offshore laundering operation that benefits a minority of the workforce.
When the US and EU close the loopholes, what you call “Irish Business” will disappear.
This government has done nothing and is powerless to prevent that from happening.
Paul. And what of all those thousands of people getting a good wage from those Companies?
A weak euro means more tourism, increased export opportunities.
I’m not sure if you count restaurants, B&Bs and hotels as part of “Irish business”, but I’m relatively sure that the people employed in these, and other “Irish businesses” are pretty happy with their pay checks.
What are you talking about Paul? We’re not banging on about CT rates here, we’re talking about a weak local currency helping Irish exports.
Irish businesses export a lot. Loads. More than most other countries typically do – in fact we’re reliant on it..
I’ll give you a real example:
Company I work in Dublin for sells exports almost exclusively. The product sold, as it happens, has almost zero demand in Ireland. Any profits the company makes (or will make), stay in Ireland. The company’s gone through hardship, but the strong dollar has definitely helped it stay afloat.
So yeah, my family finds a weak Euro beneficial.
Joe,
We’re in the Eurozone because Germany forced us to sign up to austerity measures that now appear were an abuse of their dominance in the Eurozone. We suffered while Germany profited and the end result is no different. Our citizens have been screwed by a government that betrayed them and our economy is no better off. The rich got richer, and after pirating the assets of a bankrupt economy, we now face a similar meltdown, with no bargaining chips.
Wow Paul. That’s amazing how you dig out an old broken record that’s away from the point of what’s actually being discussed.
“Not talking about what I want to rant about? Who cares!”
Mick..obviously not for all…but for a lot of those companies its been a race to the bottom in terms of driving down salary levels since 2008. I have seen Honours Degree Business Graduates starting on 21k euro a year and working a damn hard 45 hour week to get that too
Joe,
The fact that the economy is in a worse shape now than it was 8 years ago is not a broken record.
While it looks like employment is returning, the quality of that employment should be looked at carefully while the costs of living in this country have made investment here difficult to comprehend without understanding how the Irish economy operates in it’s entirety.
We are an offshore tax haven run by a corrupt political system and we use emigration as a release valve. We allow globalised corporations easy access to EU markets while enabling their avoidance of any meaningful taxation.
The people who decide that this must come to an end will not be the Irish electorate.
The problem with the Euro and the E.U. now is that it is another name for Greed…
Might head to Canada!!!
Tell me about it. Changed €350 into sterling on Friday and for a miserable £234 in exchange
It’s still better than the Celtic tiger years. The euro to pound was .67p to.69p up until 2009.
“Daddy what’s a euro?”
20 pence
I will never understand why zero inflation is seen as an evil. Inflation is life a raging fire that ravages wealth and impoverishes people. We have put the fire out…and now the lack of fire is a problem??
Look at our own country, 6% growth and zero inflation looks pretty good to me. Similarly, other countries could grow strongly without any inflation. The problems of Italy and France are its embedded structural labour problems. Type of problems that arise from civil servants being the number one job choice of school leavers.
Some of these comments are hilarious.
Who decides where to go on vacation based on exchange rates! The US is way cheaper than Ireland too..the cost of beer and wine are not a deciding factor.
“Vacation”? I don’t know about the yank here, but if hotel prices go up or down by 10 or 20% – that affects my holiday plans.
That’s unfortunate for you.
I was in Orlando in October and was priced $5.30 for a bottle of bud or 4 for $10!! Wooooohoooooo!!
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