Washington: Former Pakistan president Pervez Musharraf has said that the country's nuclear weapons are very hard targets and can never be attacked by the United States.
"I don't think it is possible from my purely military perspective for anyone, including the United States, to attack them that easily," Musharraf told Fareed Zakaria of the CNN in an interview.
"They are very well dispersed and they in very strong positions and also guarded. So, therefore, I don't think it's as simple as Osama bin Laden action or one point action, which is a soft target. This is a very hard target. These are very hard targets. And in places which are not accessible," he said.
Musharraf said that Pakistan's nuclear weapons are demated.
"As far as this mating and de-mating is concerned, they are all de-mated. I think even when we had a confrontation with India, we never mated the weapons, and I don't think India did. Because we have conventional strength to meet the challenges of war, so we don't have to go unconventional right away. So therefore they are never mated," he said.
Responding to questions, Musharraf alleged the Afghan President Hamid Karzai has refused to accept Pakistan's offer of training its security personnel.
"I have been bending backwards for Afghanistan. I have been bending backwards, asking President Karzai, we opened out all our training institutions free of cost. Come to Pakistan and we'll train you. Not one has come," he claimed.
Musharraf said he still does not trust Karzai even if he recently said that Afghanistan would support Pakistan in the event of a US-Pak war.
PTI
First Published: Monday, November 07, 2011, 10:02