The Pakistan government is awaiting parliament's recommendations for re-engaging with the US after a "challenging year" in bilateral relations,President Asif Ali Zardari said today. Relations between Pakistan and the US are "multi-dimensional and important" but "2011 was a challenging year",Zardari said during an address to a joint session of parliament. "We seek to engage meaningfully with the US on the basis of mutual interest and mutual respect. "We are looking forward to (parliament's) recommendations for re-engaging with the United States," he said in a speech that outlined his government's policies,including foreign policy priorities,for the final year of its five-year term. Ties between Pakistan and the US were affected by several crises last year,including the gunning down of two Pakistani men by CIA contractor Raymond Davis and the killing of Al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden in a raid by US special forces in the garrison town of Abbottabad. After a cross-border NATO air strike killed 24 Pakistani soldiers in November,Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani sought a parliamentary review of ties with the US and NATO. The Parliamentary Committee on National Security's recommendations for new "terms of engagement" with the US will be taken up at a joint sitting of the two houses of parliament on March 19. In his speech,Zardari noted that "parliamentary oversight and democratic accountability" had become a "new and important facet of foreign policy". He said,"We are committed to maintain our bilateral relations with all on the principles of mutual respect for each other's sovereignty,territorial integrity and equality".
