Islamabad, Pakistan – When Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif meets US President Donald Trump at the White House on Thursday, he will be carrying with him a promise unlike any that his predecessors have taken to such meetings.

For several years, Pakistan’s primary strategic value to the United States was its role as a security partner, first during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan and then during the so-called “war on terror”.

That relationship slowly collapsed amid accusations from growing sections of the US strategic community – and Trump himself – that Islamabad was duplicitous and couldn’t be trusted, especially after American forces found Osama bin Laden in Abbottabad, Pakistan.

But a high-profile signing ceremony at the Pakistan PM’s residence earlier this month offere

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