Pakistan has its own priorities: Shah Mehmood Qureshi.—AFP photo

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s foreign minister said Sunday that his country will deal with a key Taliban sanctuary along the Afghan border on its own timeline despite increasing US pressure to move swiftly to help turn around the war in Afghanistan.

Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi spoke after returning from Washington for the latest round of high-level strategic talks with the Obama administration.

His comments indicated a new $2 billion military aid package offered by the US did little change Pakistan’s strategic calculus.

”We have our own priorities. We have our own sense of timing,” said Qureshi when asked by reporters about US pressure to launch an offensive against Taliban militants in the North Waziristan tribal area.

”When you do an operation, you have to consolidate your position,” Qureshi told reporters during a news conference in the city of Lahore.

”If you do an operation without consolidating, what will happen is that you leave the place and they (the militants) will fill the gap again.”