Avoiding the Real Issue
By Ahmed Quraishi
Islamabad, Pakistan
For us in Pakistan, the real issue was and should be the murder of 69 innocent Pakistanis on Indian soil, killed by three serving Indian military intelligence officers and their accomplices. These were supposed to be our wanted Indian terrorists. 69 dead Pakistanis means almost half the number of innocents who died in Mumbai. The question is: Who turned the tables and led Pakistan to ‘own’ a list of failures that belonged to Indian officials and turned Pakistan from a sympathetic helper to the main culprit?
Fear is fatal. It shows weakness and attracts predators. And that is exactly what the current Pakistani government is guilty of. In less than two weeks and thanks to a comedy of errors, President Zardari and Prime Minister Gilani have transformed an Indian problem into a Pakistani one, shifting the debate from India’s massive security failures into a domestic quarrel between Pakistan’s conservatives and seculars. In the past week, Pakistanis saw their own federal ministers on television excitedly defend their government’s diplomatic capitulation without a shred of verifiable evidence or justification. To confuse Pakistanis, one federal minister after another took the false moral high ground of fighting ‘terror’, rebuking critics by accusing previous governments (read: ‘our military’) of supporting terrorism. Who convinced these ministers that someone in Pakistan is involved in planning the Mumbai attacks? The degree of our government’s faith in Indian police findings is stunning considering that Indians themselves don’t trust their police.
Pakistanis need to stand up and take notice. History shows that it is blunders like these by our political elites and the unnecessary capitulation to foreign pressure during crises that inflicted serious long-term damage to our interests.
There is a pattern of Pakistani failures since Nov. 28 that decisively led to the passage of a UN Security Council resolution naming Pakistani individuals and organizations without any concrete evidence. Even Chinese diplomats, whose country holds the power to veto such politically motivated one-sided resolutions, were curious why Pakistan was not interested in putting up any fight. This is also when many Pakistanis missed a strong, patriotic and learned voice in the UN in the shape of Ambassador Munir Akram, who was abruptly sent packing a few months ago. His departure and improper replacement, at a time when Pakistan needed competent representation, coupled with the recent diplomatic defeats, raises questions about the agenda and competence of the Zardari-Gilani government.
Now we have information that both Mr. Husain Haqqani and Mr. Husain Haroon, our ambassadors to US and UN respectively, were instructed by the Zardari-Gilani government to coordinate with the British and the American ambassadors to ensure that the name of former ISI chief Hameed Gul, in addition to other Pakistani citizens and organizations, are included in a Security Council resolution.
Pakistan lost half the ground in front of Indian belligerence with abrupt consent to send ISI chief to India after a ‘summon’ from New Delhi. No matter how the government spins it, that was partial admission of guilt that irreparably damaged Pakistan’s case and provided fodder to all our antagonists to gun for ISI’s neck and unnecessarily put the Pakistani military under spotlight. The overlap between this government’s eagerness to target the ISI and Washington’s interest in the agency is amazing. And just as it ignored the will of the Parliament on America’s violations of Pakistani airspace, the Zardari-Gilani government takes the same stand on the ‘technical mistake’ by Indian air force on the eastern border. The final blow to Pakistani credibility was the unjustified action against a charity organization based on foreign pressure and false accusations that have basis in the past and no relevance with the present. It is pointless now for Pakistan to ask for evidence when our government has swiftly moved to condemn us of complicity in Mumbai attacks on all fronts.
The silence of the military establishment is understandable but it is stretching the limits of our security in the broader sense. A political failure should not lead to a military failure. It is hard to find a way in the middle.
And the truth is we don’t have time and events will overwhelm us if we don’t start standing up for our interests. Despite reasonable findings and advice, former President Musharraf ignored signs that Pakistan is being cornered from the east and the west and penetrated using ethnic fault lines under the fog of America’s war on terror. The Chinese diplomats at the UN are not alone in wondering why Pakistan is adamantly set on a suicidal path. A majority of Pakistanis are asking the same question. Why did Pakistan not stick to its demand that India share evidence before taking action against Pakistani citizens? Why didn’t Pakistan resist the inclusion of Pakistani names in the UN resolution that implicitly links Pakistan to Mumbai without supportive legal evidence? Why is Pakistan not protesting India’s water blockade? Why is Pakistan supporting America in Afghanistan when it is beyond doubt that Washington is responsible for Kabul’s tilt toward India and for the activities of Indian intelligence outposts on Pakistan’s western border?
The worst part of our government’s defeatist posture in the past two weeks is that it pushed those countries that were sitting on the fence to firmly side with those opposed to us. WWW.AHMEDQURAISHI.COM
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