WASHINGTON, Sept. 21 (Xinhua) -- Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf said the United States threatened to bomb his country "back to the Stone Age" after the Sept. 11 attacks if he did not help America's war on terror.
The threat was delivered by Richard Armitage, then the deputy secretary of state, to Musharraf's intelligence director, Musharraf told CBS-TV's "60 Minutes" program.
"The intelligence director told me that (Armitage) said, 'Be prepared to be bombed. Be prepared to go back to the Stone Age,'" Musharraf said in the interview to be shown Sunday on CBS.
"I think it was a very rude remark," Musharraf said in the interview.
Armitage, former deputy secretary of state, reportedly disputed the language attributed to him but did not deny the message was a strong one.
Musharraf told "60 Minutes" program that Armitage's message was delivered with demands that he turn over Pakistan's border posts and bases for the U.S. military to use in the war against the Taliban regime in Afghanistan.
Some were "ludicrous," the president said, such as a demand to suppress domestic expression of support for terrorism against the United States.
"If somebody is expressing views, we cannot curb the expression of views," Musharraf said.
The White House on Thursday declined to comment on Musharraf's charge that the United States had threatened to bomb his country "back to the Stone Age" in 2001.
A U.S. government official, who asked not to be identified, said Pakistan had made "a strategic choice" to help after the Sept.11, 2001 terrorist attacks against the United States.
Musharraf, who is in New York for UN General Assembly, is due to meet U.S. President George W. Bush at the White House.
Before the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, Pakistan was one of the only countries in the world to maintain relations with the Taliban, which was harboring al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.
Pakistan has been one of important U.S. allies in South Asia since the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on New York and Washington. Enditem
