ANOTHER DAY, ANOTHER APOLOGY.
Barack Obama has called Pakistan's president to offer condolences over the Nato air strike that killed 24 Pakistani troops and sparked a crisis in relations between the two countries.
Obama told President Asif Ali Zardari that the soldiers' deaths were "regrettable" and accidental, according to a White House statement.
He reiterated his call for a full investigation of the 26 November incident and said the US relationship with Pakistan was critical to the security interests of both nations.
The Nato air strike sparked fury in Pakistan and complicated US-led efforts to ease tensions in relations with Islamabad, still seething at the secret US raid in May that killed al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden, and to stabilise the region before foreign combat troops leave Afghanistan in 2014.
"The president made clear that this regrettable incident was not a deliberate attack on Pakistan and reiterated the United States' strong commitment to a full investigation," the White House said.
"The two presidents reaffirmed their commitment to the US-Pakistan bilateral relationship, which is critical to the security of both nations, and they agreed to stay in close touch," the statement added.
Obama's phone call came on the eve of an international conference in Germany on the future of Afghanistan. Pakistan is boycotting the conference because of the Nato air strikes.
Hillary Clinton, the US secretary of state, spoke by phone with Pakistan's prime minister Yusuf Raza Gilani on Saturday to offer condolences.
However the simmering tension between the US and Pakistan was further highlighted by John McCain, who said that aid to Pakistan should have more conditions attached to it. Senator McCain said the billions of dollars of US aid to Pakistan must come with strings attached.
The top Republican on the Senate Armed Services Committee, which helps to oversee that money, McCain said Pakistan should show that it is helping to "prevent the needless deaths of young Americans."
His comment on CNN's State of the Union shows the acute frustration in Congress because of alleged ties between Pakistan's intelligence service and anti-US insurgents.
McCain also said the US should "explore all alternatives" to using Pakistani territory to supply Nato forces in Afghanistan although he did not provide specifics. Pakistan closed the supply routes in protest after November's air strike against its troops.
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