NEW YORK, May 12: Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani warned on Wednesday that continuing to work with the US could “imperil his government, unless Washington takes drastic steps to restore trust and win over 180 million Pakistanis”.

In an exclusive interview with Time magazine, his first since the US raid which killed Osama bin Laden, Mr Gilani observed that cooperation between the CIA and its Pakistani counterpart, the ISI had broken down and that Washington and Islamabad differed on how to fight terrorism and forge an exit strategy in Afghanistan.

He, however, publicly offered for the first time to support US drone strikes inside Pakistan, provided that Pakistan was in on the decision making.

The prime minister expressed fear that a deteriorating relationship with Washington could hurt Pakistan’s fight against domestic militancy.

“When there’s a trust deficit,” he said, “there will be problems in intelligence sharing.”

Asked about the reason for this trust deficit, Mr Gilani replied tersely, “It’s not from our side. Ask them.”

The Time said despite his constant references to the trust deficit, Mr Gilani indicated that he hoped to see a restoration of closer ties but put the onus on Washington to gain the support of Pakistani citizens.

“They should do something for the public which will persuade them that the US is supportive of Pakistan”.

As an example, he enviously cited the 2008 US-India Civil Nuclear Agreement.

“It’s our public that’s dying, but the deal is happening there,” the primeminister said.

“You claim there’s a strategic partnership? That we’re best friends?”

Casting his eyes up at his chandeliered ceiling, Mr Gilani reached for a verse. “When we passed each other, she didn’t deign to even say hello,” he intoned, quoting the Urdu poet Mirza Ghalib.

“How, then, can I believe that our parting caused her any tears?”

The magazine said the prime minister claimed the role of the aggrieved party in a deteriorating relationship. He complained repeatedly throughout the 45-minute breakfast interview about the widening “trust deficit” between the two allies.

Alternating between Urdu and English, the prime minister warned that his government was accountable to an electorate that was increasingly hostile to the US. “I am not an army dictator; I’m a public figure,” he said.

“If public opinion is against you, then I cannot resist it to stand with you. I have to go with public opinion.”

The Time observed that while the Bin Laden debacle had raised calls in Washington to pressurise Pakistan for more cooperation, in Islamabad it had raised further hostility toward the US.

Speaking of the Abbottabad raid, Mr Gilani said: “Naturally, we wondered why [the US] went unilaterally. If we’re fighting a war together, we have to work together. Even if there was credible and actionable information, then we should have done it jointly.”

The prime minister said he was first alerted to the raid by a 2am call from army chief General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani. He then called his Foreign Secretary and asked him to demand an explanation from US Ambassador Cameron Munter. “I have not met or spoken to [US officials] since,” he complained.

“Whatever information we are receiving is from the media. Today we have said that we want them to talk to us directly.”

On the deepening rift between Washington and Islamabad which casts a shadow over Afghanistan, where their cooperation is vital to enable a US exit strategy, the Pakistani leader emphasised his strengthening links with Afghan President Hamid Karzai and the many bonds that unite the two peoples. But that doesn’t necessarily translate into support for the US strategy there.

”In our discussions with Karzai, we came to an agreement that terrorists are our common enemy. We both have suffered; we both have made sacrifices.

So we have decided to unite to fight against them,” Mr Gilani said.

To prove this recent intimacy, he showed off a beautifully carved, single-slab lapis lazuli coffee-table top, encased in velvet.

“It was a gift from Karzai,” he said. “It arrived a week ago.”

Despite his rapprochement with Karzai, Gilani acknowledged his abiding “difference of opinion” with Washington on how best to fight militancy.

“From day one, my policy has been the three Ds: dialogue, development and deterrence,” Gilani said.

“The first time I shared my strategy with President Bush, it sounded Greek to him. Today the whole world is toeing the same line.”

In that vein, he criticised the US surge in Afghanistan: “Military solutions cannot be permanent solutions. There has to be a political solution, some kind of exit strategy.

Mr Gilani favours a political solution to the conflict next door, led by the Afghans.

“It should be owned by them and be on their own initiative,” the prime minister said. He saw Pakistan’s role as that of a ‘facilitator.’

US officials have routinely criticised Pakistan for allowing Afghan Taliban leaders and fighters to operate from its soil.

Mr Gilani said the drone war weakened his efforts to rally public support for the fight against extremism. “No one can win a war without the support of the public,” he said.“I say that this is my war, but when drones strike, the people ask, ‘Whose war is this, then?’ “Still, Mr Gilani said — for the first time, publicly — that he was open to renegotiating the terms of the CIA’s programme.

“A drone strategy can be worked out,” he said.

“If drone strikes are effective, then we should evolve a common strategy to win over public opinion. Our position is that the technology should be transferred to us.” Still, he added, he would countenance a policy in which the CIA would continue to operate the drones “where they are used under our supervision”.

That statement marks a departure from Pakistan’s frequent public denunciations of drone strikes as intolerable violations of sovereignty.