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| Kamal gets VIP treatment from State Dept: CNN |
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Monday, May 05, 2008
KARACHI: City Nazim Syed Mustafa Kamal is getting VIP treatment from the US State Department in Washington. "The Mayor of Karachi is a guest with a mission," the US TV Channel CNN reported on Sunday in a transcript of the interview with Kamal, who is currently on an official tour of the US.
State Department Correspondent of the CNN, Zain Virjee, said the State Department brings in thousands of people each year from all over the world to promote understanding. The US hopes that cultivating a young Pakistani politician now would help the relationship with Pakistan bloom later.
Kamal said his visit to the US was ìquite overwhelmingî and was a good opportunity to explain about his city. He said the kind of response he was getting in the US was extraordinary. The Karachi Nazim said he had been able to interact well with people there, and this helped him in ìbuilding a good image of Karachi, the largest city of Pakistan, because people had misconceptions about this mega city.î
Kamal further said he wanted to inform people about the development being made in Karachi. This development, he said, was an ongoing process and it was due to this process the local and foreign investment was ìpouring inî, and it was billions of dollars, Kamal said.
APP adds: Nazim Karachi Syed Mustafa Kamal has said that he was in the US to remake the image of Karachi. Syed Mustafa Kamal, who is on an official visit to the US at the invitation of the State Department, was interviewed by the CNN’s State Department Correspondent Zain Verjee. At the start of the interview, Verjee commented that the US friendship with Pakistan wasn’t exactly what it was. A power shift and Pakistan’s new relationship with extremists is testing that bond. So the State Department is working to build bridges with Pakistan’s future while he (Syed Kamal) was getting star treatment at the State Department.
The mayor of Karachi is a guest with a mission. When Mustafa Kamal was asked what the experience had been like for him here on the State Department programme, he remarked that it was quite overwhelming and for the kind of response he was getting.
Verjee said the State Department brought in thousands of people each year from all over the world to promote understanding and Kamal had got a packed schedule that was keeping him and his escorts on the run. The Nazim Karachi remarked it was good to see people and meet people.
Verjee referred to Kamal’s visit to the Capitol Hill, the New York Stock Exchange, Houston and then Chicago to which Nazim pointed out that he was really glad that he got this chance to explain his city.
While referring to Karachi as sprawling port city, one of the world’s largest, 16 million people, can be scary, the interviewers said it was where the al Qaeda leaders had been captured, where terrorists tried to assassinate Benazir Bhutto and where journalist Daniel Pearl was killed and observed that the mayor had got a tough job to remake the image. Mustafa Kamal responded that’s what he was here for.
Verjee quoted the US saying that al Qaeda had a free run of Pakistan’s tribal areas, free to plot terror attacks against the US and asked if the new government was going to be as committed to fighting terrorism as Musharraf said he was. Mustafa Kamal said the way they had been committing to the war, he thought they were serious, but only time would tell.
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