By Arun Kumar, IANS,
Washington : Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari says he hopes to build better relations with India after its parliamentary elections and “if our American friends can help us, they’re welcome to.”
“I know they are busy at the moment. Democracies are always willing to work with democracies,” Zardari told reporters after a meeting Thursday with members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee along with his Afghan President Hamid Karzai.
“I’m hoping for better relations. And if our American friends can help us in doing so, they’re welcome to,” he said.
In an interview Tuesday with CNN, Zardari he had said that Pakistan wanted peace with India.
“Democracies have never gone to war. No Pakistan democratic government has gone to war with India. We’ve always wanted peace. We still want peace with India,” he said
“I’m waiting for the (Indian general) elections to be over so that all of this rhetoric is over and I can start a fresh dialogue with the Indian government,” he told CNN.
Zardari said Pakistan also wanted a commercial relationship with India. “We want a commercial relationship with them. I’m looking at the markets of India for the industrialists of Pakistan and hoping to do the same.”
Zardari and Karzai are in the US to attend the trilateral meeting with the US. The two day meeting concluded Thursday.