Sharief arrived in Washington on Wednesday and was provided access to high administration officials, including deputy secretary of state Strobe Talbott, in a bid to corral Pakistan into a non-proliferation regime. Pakistan has been steadfastly refusing to commit itself to anything unless what it calls the core issue of Kashmir is addressed. Washington has been trying to persuade Islamabad not to link Kashmir to the non-proliferation drive while promising to keep the international spotlight on the dispute.

US officials acknowledged that they considered Shahbaz Sharief a key player in Pakistan and a confidante of the Prime Minister.

Talbott, the administration's principal interlocutor on the proliferation matter, has been meeting with a range of Pakistani leadership in a bid to win them over. While Shahbaz Sharief represents the personal and political track to the Pakistan's beleaguered prime minister, Talbott has also met Sharief's special envoy Sahibzada Yakub Khan, who was pulled out of the woodworks and sent to Washington last month, probably as a sop to a section of the establishment.

Talbott is also scheduled to meet foreign secretary Shamshad Ahmed, who represents the regular track of diplomacy, for talks in London on August 25, soon after he concludes talks with the Indian special envoy Jaswant Singh in Washington on August 24.

Sources also said a key item on the agenda in discussions between Sharief and US officials will be the developments in Pakistan and Afghanistan following the US embassy bombings in East Africa. Islamabad has been miffed, if not outraged, by the dramatic evacuation of American citizens and US personnel from Pakistan. Although it publicly has said it understands American compulsions, it considers it a slight, not to speak of the developments constituting a ghastly setback to its effort to restore its economic spirits.

But US officials on Wednesday reportedly offered proof to Sharief showing the threat to Americans in Pakistan was genuine and the evacuation was called for.

The sudden, and practically wholesale evacuation of Americans in Pakistan, has also led to reports that Washington may be planning to stage a commando-like raid on millionaire-terrorist Osama Bin Laden's hideout in Afghanistan.

The US was rebuffed on Wednesday in its their efforts to get to Bin Laden through diplomatic channels. The Taliban rulers of Afghanistan bluntly rejected a US plea saying it would not hand him over even if the Americans provided proof he was behind the bombings. ``It is not right to give a Muslim to an infidel country,'' Afghan foreign minister Mullah Mohammed Hasan was quoted as saying. He said he was convinced bin Laden had nothing to do with the embassy bombings, but if proven otherwise, he could be punished in Afghanistan.

Pakistan has officially backed the Taliban and is one of the only three countries in the world to have recognised the fundamentalist regime. It recently called upon rest of the world to recognise the Taliban. US officials are expected to lean on Pakistan to flush Bin Laden our of his hideout.

Sources said Sharief on his part is also expected to raise the issue of alleged subversive activity by India in Pakistan. Sharief has also been meeting with the Pakistani community in the US in a bid to rally support for his brother. He first went to Chicago where he attended a Pakistani Independence Day celebration and attended a dinner hosted by business magnate Rashid Chaudhury. In Washington, he was guest last night at a dinner hosted by a family friend and shipping magnate Saeed Sheikh.