Pakistan’s ambassador to the United States resigns

Husain Haqqani, Pakistan’s ambassador to the United States, resigned today at the request of Pakistan’s Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani, the New York Times reported.

Haqqani has been accused of soliciting US help to stop a possible military-led coup in return for replacing Pakistani military and intelligence leaders with US-friendly military officials, Bloomberg Businessweek reported.

Mansoor Ijaz, a Pakistani American businessman, claims Haqqani asked him to deliver a memo containing the request to Adm. Mike Mullen, then the chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, shortly after Osama bin Laden was killed in May, the Times reported.

Haqqani denies any involvement with the memo, the Times reported.

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According to the Guardian:

Many believe that Haqqani was set up by elements associated with the military. He was no ordinary ambassador but a close adviser to Zardari, and his easy access to the top US military and civilian leadership was viewed with deep suspicion by Pakistan's military establishment.

“I have requested [the prime minister, Yousaf Raza] Gilani to accept my resignation as Pakistan ambassador to US," Haqqani announced on Twitter today, the Guardian reported. "I have much to contribute to building a new Pakistan free of bigotry and intolerance. Will focus energies on that."

Haqqani had offered to resign last week to stop the “memogate” affair from creating new tensions between Pakistan’s military and civilian-led government, but the government did not immediately take him up on the offer.

More from GlobalPost: Husain Haqqani, Pakistan's ambassador to US, offers to resign

“The fact that Mr. Haqqani has been virtually sacked speaks of which way the wind is blowing,” Arif Nizami, editor of the English-language daily newspaper Pakistan Today, told the Times. “The military had never been in love with Mr. Haqqani and was critical of his role in Washington, D.C.”

Haqqani’s resignation will hurt efforts to repair the US-Pakistani relationship, which is currently going through a rocky patch, Shuja Nawaz, a South Asia analyst at the Washington-based Atlantic Council, told Bloomberg Businessweek.

“The timing of this is very unfortunate,” Nawaz said. “It will be very difficult for any successor to pursue” Haqqani’s attempt to rebuild trust between the US and Pakistan, he said.