Obama would send US troops to Pakistan to hunt down terrorists

Majority in Pakistan 'Obamaistic'
Islamabad (PTI): Despite Barack Hussain Obama's resolve that he would send US troops to Pakistan to hunt down terrorists, citizens here are revelling in the fact that America's President-elect has a Pakistani link that dates back to 1981 and more so because his middle name suggests he is a 'Muslim'.

Obama's Pakistan connection has been widely speculated about in the local and international media since his remark last year that if elected as President, he may send troops to Pakistan to hunt down terrorists. Obama is believed to have visited Pakistan in 1981.

"Mr Obama visited Pakistan in 1981, on the way back from Indonesia, where his mother and half-sister, Maya Soetoro-Ng, were living. He spent about three weeks there.. staying in Karachi with the family of a college friend, Mohammed Hasan Chandoo but also traveling to Hyderabad, in India," a report in the New York Times quoted his campaign manager as saying.

Interest in the 47-year-old first black President of US rose in Pakistan after reports said Obama's mother Ann Dunham had spent five years in the country. Dunham, who died in 1995, was in Pakistan between 1987 and 1992. She was hired as a consultant by the Asian Development Bank and travelled often from Lahore to Gujranwala.

"I have a dream that the damage wrought in the US and other countries will be overturned in the next four years to a great extent. You are black. You are white. Your father is from Kenya. Your mother is from Kansas. You have seen Muslim. You have seen Christian," wrote Soniah Kamal in an e-magazine.

"They called you terrorist because once you crossed streets with a domestic terrorist. They called you socialist because you care about all and not just an elite few. They called you Muslim as if this is a four letter word," she added.