The four-day official visit of Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani to China, beginning today, is being considered far more important than previous visits by our leaders to the country in the past. The reason is the situation Pakistan is passing through at the moment and the 'threats it is facing at the hands of the US. Despite the fact that Pakistan has so far sacrificed lives of some 35,000 people, one seventh of them belonging to security forces, the US does not trust it. Its May 2 unilateral commando action in which Osama bin Laden was killed has widened the trust deficit between the two countries. While tension between the two countries is growing acute, a press report suggests that President Obama has approved a plan under which US troops will be deployed in Pakistan if our nuclear installations come under threat of terrorists. Before doing so, the report says, Pakistans leadership will not be informed. US Senator John Kerry, now on a visit to Islamabad, says the Pak-US ties are at a 'critical moment and that consequences could be serious if these ties are snapped. Strong signals for aid cuts are also being sent. A US Congressman has been reported as saying that 'ally may be too strong a word to describe the country. Pakistans parliament has adopted a strong resolution binding it not to offer unconditional cooperation to the US. It is under these circumstances that Mr Gilani is proceeding to China, a country that Pakistan can fully rely on, and the decisions taken there would be minutely examined by other countries, particularly by the US and India. To frustrate the designs of the enemies of Pakistan who are also enemies of China it is important for the leaders of the two countries to send a strong signal to them that they should desist from doing anything that could disturb peace in the region. It is extremely important to make the hostile world know the solidarity in ties that exists between the two, and it should be expressed in strong terms.