Islamabad, April 5:

Pakistan will fight terrorism as its top priority but will also negotiate with militant groups “willing to lay down their arms,” the country’s new prime minister Yousaf Raza Gilani said today.

Yousaf Raza Gilani said in his first policy speech that the government also will seek to reinstate judges ousted by President Pervez Musharraf last year — a move that could prompt a showdown with the US-backed leader. “We are confronting many challenges, but we are not afraid of these challenges, and we will face them,” Gilani told lawmakers. Underlining the transformation of Pakistan’s political landscape, lawmakers today gave a unanimous vote of confidence to Gilani, a loyalist of slain former PM Benazir Bhutto.

In a gesture to Western nations concerned that Musharraf’s decline could result in an easing of Pakistan’s efforts to counter Al-Qaeda and Taliban militants entrenched along the Afghan border, Gilani said fighting terrorism would be his government’s “top priority.” “The war against terrorism is our own war,” Gilani told lawmakers. But he also said authorities also were “ready to hold talks with those who will lay down their arms” in order to restore peace. Gilani promised to develop the impoverished border region’s economy and to abolish criminal codes dating back to British colonial rule that contribute to its isolation. However, he gave no indication whether his government was prepared to negotiate with hardcore militants blamed for a wave of suicide attacks in Afghanistan and, increasingly, in Pakistan.