Abracadabrah

I create as I speak

Condi Personally Intervening for Mukhtaran Mai

Glad to see Condi is personally intervening.

State Department deputy spokesman Adam Ereli said Tuesday the issue was raised last Thursday by Rice, in a telephone call with Pakistan Foreign Minister Khurshid Kasuri.

"Secretary Rice made it clear that Mrs. Mai was welcome to come to the United States at any time and that we were looking to the government of Pakistan to ensure that she was free to travel whenever she wanted," he said.

"The government of Pakistan has committed itself to that and therefore it is our expectation that should Mrs Mai want to travel, to come to the United States, there will be no obstacles presented to her to do so," Ereli said.

Mai's case arose again Tuesday when New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof wrote that the Pakistani government had still not returned her passport.

But a senior State Department official said on condition of anonymity that US officials believed that one of Mai's minders or bodyguards had her passport.

"Whoever has her passport, there is not going to be any obstacle to her travelling to the United States," the official said. "Her freedoms, and her rights and wellbeing are what we are concerned about and we are going to act to protect those."

Let's see if she manages a visit sometime soon. I bet she'll get big crowds after all this excitement. The Pakistanis have done precisely the wrong thing to assure her anonymity. They've made her a much bigger deal than otherwise.

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posted by Alcibiades @ 3:45 PM