'U.S. averted Indo-Pak. war in 1999'

WASHINGTON, OCT. 21. The United States helped avert what might have been a possible catastrophic war between India and Pakistan in 1999, the U.S. President Mr. Bill Clinton's National Security Advisor, Mr. Samuel Berger has said.

The U.S. ``helped pull nuclear-armed India and Pakistan from the brink of what might have been a catastrophic war in 1999,'' Mr. Berger told Georgetown University students here on Friday in a major foreign policy address.

Stating that local conflicts could have global consequences, he said, the U.S. worked for peace in the middle east, the Balkans, northern Ireland, India and Pakistan because ``we believe that the challenge of foreign policy in any age is to defuse conflicts before, not after they escalate and harm our vital interests,''he said.

- PTI

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Section  : International
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