WASHINGTON, Sept 9: US President George W. Bush on Tuesday named Pakistan among the major battlegrounds in the global war on terrorism and reminded Islamabad that it was its responsibility to eradicate terrorism from the tribal areas.

“Defeating these terrorists and extremists is also Pakistan’s responsibility — because every nation has an obligation to govern its own territory and make certain that it does not become a safe haven for terror,” he said.

In a speech to the US National Defence University, Mr Bush also revealed that earlier on Tuesday he had telephoned President Asif Ali Zardari and “pledged the full support of America’s government as Pakistan takes the fight to the terrorists and extremists in the border regions”.

Mr Bush said that Iraq, Afghanistan and “parts of Pakistan” posed “unique challenges” to the United States.

“They’re all theatres in the same overall struggle. In all three places, extremists are using violence and terror in an attempt to impose their ideology on whole populations,” he said. “They murder to impose their dark vision of the world.”

Mr Bush said that in all three places, America was “standing strongly with brave elected leaders and determined reformers and millions of ordinary citizens who seek a future of liberty and justice and tolerance”.

In Washington’s diplomatic circles, the speech is seen as a move aimed at telling the new government in Islamabad that in the war on terror it has no option but to continue to play the role assigned to it after the Sept 11, 2001, terrorist attacks in the United States.

The strategy outlined in the speech makes it clear that the new government will have to continue to pursue the policies of the Musharraf administration for combating militants in tribal areas and in the rest of the country — a policy which contributed to the former president’s unpopularity in Pakistan.

Mr Bush’s message follows US air and ground strikes inside Pakistan’s tribal belt, killing dozens of people, including women and children.

Although he devoted part of the speech to Pakistan, Mr Bush’s focus was Afghanistan where he is now redeploying more than half of the troops withdrawn from Iraq.

The US will withdraw about 8,000 of its 146,000 soldiers in Iraq by February — and send 4,500 more to join the 33,000 in Afghanistan.

Mr Bush said that the improved security situation in Iraq permitted a “quiet surge” of troops in Afghanistan in the coming months.

By doing so, Mr Bush is trying to set the agenda for the next administration which will replace his government in January.

Redeployment of troops and an increased US involvement in Afghanistan will make it difficult for the next administration to disengage itself from the Afghan conflict any time soon.

Both Democratic and Republican presidential candidates, however, have already said that unlike Iraq, they want the US to succeed in Afghanistan and are willing to commit more US troops to achieve this target.

Mr Bush, in his speech, not only expressed a strong support to Afghanistan but also endorsed Kabul’s claim that terrorists hiding in Pakistan’s tribal areas were responsible for much of the bloodshed inside Afghanistan.

“With the help of their sanctuary in Pakistan, they ruthlessly attacked innocent Afghans across the country,” Mr Bush said.

The speech indicates a major shift in US attitudes towards Pakistan’s western frontier where once Islamabad was a key US ally while Kabul was a member of the Soviet bloc.

Now the United States has a direct military presence in Afghanistan while its policies are strongly resisted by religious militants in Pakistan.

South Asian analysts in Washington say that this change in ground realities has encouraged the US to view Pakistan from Afghanistan’s prism.

And Mr Bush endorsed this view by telling Pakistanis that their country had become a base for destabilising Afghanistan’s nascent democracy.

“As we take these new steps in Afghanistan, we must also help the government of Pakistan defeat Taliban and Al Qaeda fighters hiding in remote border regions of their country,” he said.

“These extremists are increasingly using Pakistan as a base from which to destabilise Afghanistan’s young democracy.”

But Mr Bush acknowledged that in the past year, the Taliban, Al Qaeda and other extremist groups operating in the tribal regions have stepped up their attacks against the Pakistani government, “hoping to stop that country’s democratic progress, as well”.

He reminded Islamabad that defeating these terrorists and extremists was in Pakistan’s interest because they posed a mortal threat to Pakistan’s future as a free and democratic nation.

Mr Bush, however, assured Pakistan that America and its Nato allies would continue to help in its efforts to defeat the extremists.

“The same terrorists who murdered innocent civilians in Karachi and Islamabad are plotting new attacks against the United States and Europe.”