THINK before taking unilateral action in Pak: Kayani to US

Warning that Pakistan, a nuclear power, was not like Afghanistan or Iraq, the country's powerful army chief General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani said United States would have to think "10 times" before launching an unilateral action in the restive North Waziristan.

"They (US) might do it but they will have to think ten times because Pakistan is not Iraq or Afghanistan," Kayani was quoted by The Express Tribune newspaper as telling members of parliament's defence committee during a briefing at the general headquarters on Wednesday.

Kayani made the remarks when a lawmaker asked him to comment on the possibility of a US strike in Pakistan, like American attacks in Laos and Cambodia before the withdrawal from Vietnam.

The Dawn daily reported that Kayani did not say what Pakistan's response would be in such an eventuality but he reminded the lawmakers that the country was a "nuclear power" and must not be compared with Iraq and Afghanistan.

The rare briefing for members of the standing committees on defence of the two houses of parliament lasted over three hours.

The US has been putting up pressure on Pakistan for years to go after Haqqani network militants in North Waziristan, who cross the border to attack US and NATO forces in Afghanistan. The pressure has become intense since US Navy SEALs killed Osama bin Laden in May in Abbottabad and especially after the audacious attack on the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation headquarters and the US embassy in Kabul last month.

Kayani acknowledged that the US was pressing Pakistan to launch a military operation in North Waziristan and said an ongoing build-up of Afghan and International Security Assistance Force troops along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border is a tactic to "intensify that pressure", The Express Tribune reported.

Kayani added that Pakistan will decide on the timing of the operation depending on the situation and capability. "We have made it clear to the US that we will decide the timing of any such action according to our situation and capabilities. We have also told them that the problem lies within Afghanistan. If anyone convinces me that everything will be sorted out if we act in North Waziristan, I will take immediate action," Kayani said.