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Counter-terrorism

In the conversation that I had with President Zardari, and then separately with Prime Minister Gillani, they first gave me their assurance that they did not know that bin Laden was living in Abbottabad and that they did not have such an understanding. I clearly made the point that the Pakistanis were going to be asked a lot of very searching questions by friends and foes alike over the coming days and needed to be prepared to answer them, but I come back to this basic point: what is in our national interest? Is it in our interest to have an enormous bust-up and argument with Pakistan over this, or is it in our interest to say, ““Right, we're going to work with the forces of democracy in Pakistan that want to fight terror and terrorism””? That must be in our interest, and it is what we should adhere to.