Imran Khan wants to avoid expensive hotels on US visit
In order to do away with heavy hotel bills during his three-day visit to the United States, Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan has expressed his desire to stay at the official residence of the country's ambassadors. Khan is slated to visit the Donald Trump-led country on July 21.
According to media reports, Khan can considerably cut down the cost of his US visit while staying at the residence of Ambassador Asad Majeed Khan. Neither the US Secret Service nor the city administration appeared "very receptive" to the idea, the report said.
The US Secret Service takes over the security of a visiting dignitary as soon as he or she lands in America, while the city administration has to ensure that the visit does not disrupt Washington's traffic.
Each year, a number of presidents and prime ministers from across the world pay visits to the United States and the US federal government works jointly with the city administration to ensure that those visits do not disturb the capital's normal life.
The Ambassador's residence is in the heart of Washington's diplomatic enclave, where there are at least a dozen embassies in and around that area, including those of India, Turkey and Japan.
A visiting government head also holds a number of meetings with US officials, lawmakers and media and think-tank representatives during his stay in Washington, Dawn said in the report.
Since the residence is not large enough for all these meetings, Khan will have to meet his guests at the Pakistan embassy, commuting through Washington's busy traffic during rush hours.
To do so, his entourage will have to drive by most of these embassies as well as US Vice President Mike Pence's official residence.
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