Obama Meets With Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari And Afghan President Hamid Karzai

By JULIE PACE 05/21/12 04:54 PM ET

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From left, President Barack Obama, NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen, Afghan President Hamid Karzai, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari talk during a family picture of NATO leaders at the NATO Summit in Chicago, Monday, May 21, 2012. (AP Photo/Philippe Wojazer, Pool)

CHICAGO — President Barack Obama says the U.S. is making "diligent progress" on re-opening supply routes from Pakistan to Afghanistan.

Obama and Afghanistan's President Hamid Karzai spoke briefly with Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari on the sidelines of the NATO summit Monday. U.S. officials had indicated Obama would not hold a formal bilateral meeting with Zardari as long as the supply route matter remained unresolved.

The U.S. and Pakistan are in a dispute over Pakistan's closure of key trucking routes used to send supplies to NATO troops in Afghanistan. Pakistan closed the supply lines after a U.S. airstrike killed two dozen Pakistani soldiers.

Obama says Zardari told him these issues could get "worked through."

Obama says NATO is unified on a plan to responsibly wind down war in Afghanistan.

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A soldier of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) walks at the site of a suicide attack in front of a guesthouse in Kabul on May 2, 2012. (SHAH MARAI/AFP/GettyImages)

Afghanistan is a top priority on the Chicago Summit agenda. NATO plans to complete its ISAF mission by the end of 2014 with a transition that involves moving security responsibility from ISAF forces to full Afghan leadership. NATO also has invited Pakistan to the summit in hopes of convincing its leaders to reopen its border to NATO troop supplies. The border was closed permanently following a NATO-led airstrike on a Pakistani army checkpoint near the Afghan border that killed 24 soldiers in 2011.

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BG-back

353 Fans

09:41 AM on 05/22/2012

The master meeting his two poodles...

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Gingerland

375 Fans

07:53 AM on 05/22/2012

American tazpayers and their inexperienced President are dupes for giving Karzai and Zardari additional 100s of millions to pad their personal fortunes.

09:43 AM on 05/22/2012

Buying off puppets do do your bidding is not cheap... specially nowadays.

07:48 AM on 05/22/2012

If you want get a feeling of just how corrupt the Pakistani leadership is just google Zardari's palace in Dubai. The billionaire owns many other properties around the world including lavish horse farms in the UK....yet they are still trying to shake down the Americans for more cash.

He really is despicable...

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Susan Shaffer

watching you...

2463 Fans

02:42 PM on 05/22/2012

Benazir Bhutto had an arranged marriage to Zardari. Do you think the family which had produced a president (Benazir's father) would allow their daughter to marry poor. That is like thinking Bush's daughters would marry janitors. Come on, everybody knows the rules of the game.

Davinci Mode

When you throw dirt, you lose ground.

103 Fans

07:26 AM on 05/22/2012

Opening the NATO Supply Route will be a suicidal attempt for Pakistani rulers in power as the public will toss them off. Public of Pakistan is rightly stuck on two points for the opening of that route.

1. An unconditional apology by US for killing Pakistani troops.
2. No more Drone attacks and killings of innocent civilians.

US and NATO badly need to realize the fact that they can not survive in Afghanistan without the help of Pakistan no r they can exit from the mess they created in that region without Pakistan's help.

Pauline Jaing

Artist, worker, mother

448 Fans

06:23 AM on 05/22/2012

So we slaughtered 24 Pakistni soldiers, and we won't apologize for it!?

Astosnihing HUBRIS, ARROGANCE and contempt for the Pakistani people. Really our elite is astonishing in its hubris, makes King George look like a humble man.

07:49 AM on 05/22/2012

Has Pakistan apologized for providing a safe haven for bin Laden and his family?

mountcarmine

67 Fans

11:19 PM on 05/21/2012

After this meeting Obama better count his teeth.

sgtriker55

104 Fans

12:20 AM on 05/22/2012

/NATO Protests and the Chicago Slime Jobhttp://www.zengardner.com/nato-protests-and-the-chicago-slime-job/

94613

288 Fans

10:51 PM on 05/21/2012

Mr 10% and Country are "fleecing" American Taxpayers. So much for the fatwah againist usury. "$5,000 per trkld versus $250" ? (NyTimes A6, tdy)

Yasser Yousufi

Parthian

329 Fans

03:05 AM on 05/22/2012

Every Truckload of that war machinery costs Pakistan at least $25000 after including all the overheads this war has brought to Pakistan which Pakistanis were FORCED to join by US.

NeverBendover

45 Fans

01:47 PM on 05/22/2012

Why was bin laden found in your country hidden safely near a military compound? No fault of your? Really? Delusional immoral Islamist.

02:43 PM on 05/22/2012

yasser have you got proof of that statement about the cost in overheads?

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07:50 AM on 05/22/2012

Shameless billionaire Zardari...

ussuri

ask questions, question answers

659 Fans

09:27 PM on 05/21/2012

American taxpayers paying $ 2 BILLION @ DAY on military,
instead of education,healthcare, etc..

10:53 PM on 05/21/2012

As if spending more $ on the Military versus the next 5-8 countries combined helps educate the next generation...

Oh, it educates all right, but not in the way even those who do it would like.

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IranianDude

117 Fans

09:15 PM on 05/21/2012

Obama to Pakistan and Afghanis officials: "Sorry about our drones indiscriminately killing your civilians. But remember boys, I'm an anti war president ... I even have Nobel Peace Prize!"

April22

Some experiences in life are ineffable

1228 Fans

09:07 PM on 05/21/2012

No surprise Afghanistan is a top priority on the Chicago NATO Summit agenda.

I can think of two reasons why.

Afghanistan is a crucial energy transit corridor in Central Asia and is crucial for the TAPI (Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India) natural gas pipeline to being built and NATO will be a part of having its security guaranteed, along with the Afghan Army.

According to a joint team from the Pentagon, US Geological Service and USAID, Afghanistan's mineral deposits could be worth more than $900 billion. The top two minerals being iron coming in at $420.9 billion and copper for $274 billion.

You can bet the US is going to work out their problems with Pakistan and the supply route will again open.