Friday, May 6, 2022
Imran Khan’s Conspiracy Myth: A Debacle – OpEd
By Asad Ali
An excellent critic of human psychology, Shakespeare, has aptly said, “There is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so.” John Milton further explains it as “The mind is its own place and, in itself can make a heaven of hell or a hell of heaven.” –
The rising polarization in our society due to political differences is dividing people in such a way that each party proclaims to be righteous in its narrative shunning away the stance of the rivals. The flood of information available on social media these days is unhelpful in educating rather confusing the youth by aggravating the divide and this is an alarming situation for a under developing country like Pakistan. The dilemma is that unlike any healthy debate or academic discussion the verbal circumlocution is turning violent endangering the very norms and ethics of a society. In my humble opinion, we have reached this state of affairs due to reason that human development has never been the priority of the stalwarts of the country. As per internationally set standards a sane nation spends almost five percent of its annual budget on education and five percent on health for the better upbringing and grooming of its citizens whereas in the case of Pakistan both education and health budget never exceeded to 2.5 percent which is indeed a criminal negligence. The mental approach of our people is still below the belt and instead of taking the responsibility for correcting any mess they want some messiah to come and put everything in order.
We also need to learn that the democratic political process requires a natural process and pick and chose formula on the basis of personal liking and disliking can be very hazardous for the whole political process. The political engineering is the refutation of the very philosophy of democratic process and even more contemptuous than dictatorship. This is unfortunate that most of our top brass political leadership has landed on parachute without any significance training at grass root level politics. They have no plan, no understanding of core issues, and no vision to reform and above all they have no art of team selection on merit but personal loyalty. Another factor we often ignore is we need to promote normal professionals instead of elevating celebrities, feudal and business tycoons in our politics because the experience has proven them narcissists who can compromise even the national security for their petty political gains.
Imran Khan, has turned out to be a cultist-populist, or a messiah kind of a figure – someone who people follow without demanding too much evidence. Khan has proven himself to be the most selfish politician instead of displaying the spirit of a statesman which needed in these critical times and he has ended up being a charisma that people believed in because they were taught that everything else was sham.
Although the PTI conspiracy narrative of foreign intrusion is nothing but a hoax articulated by intelligentsia as sham yet it is selling. Paradoxically now even Imran himself has deviated to use this narrative and has started targeting the election commission but the majority of his party workers still believe involvement of a foreign hand in removing him from the power.
The National Security Committee which is the highest security forum of the country has repeatedly stated that there was no foreign involvement in dislodging Imran khan from PM House. It has become clear that this narrative was concocted to serve the nefarious political pursuits and to win the sympathy of the public.Khan did not stop but for his political interests he has engineered many controversies to put the whole parliamentary system, the judiciary, the security establishment and other state institutions on fire. He has leveled serious charges on the loyalty of his political rivals with the country in the name of keeping Pakistan’s foreign policy independent from interference.The incompetency and his party’s less-than-stellar performance is being covered under cheap slogans and narratives that entirely nothing to do with reality. The anti-corruption narrative of PTI has also not worked because there are many serious allegations on the corruption of PTI’s ministers and associates. One need only question why the PTI is frequently switching its narrative between ‘conspiracies’, ‘interference’ and ‘establishment’s mistake’ to understand that it is a smoke screen. Its real purpose is to stay in power by hook or by crook and for this they want early elections. Here again our PTI friends are mistaken that they can get majority in the assembly in result of these elections.
In all this, the previously serving ambassador of Pakistan to America stand vindicated rather it was use of undiplomatic language for which due protest was registered to the US incharge of diplomatic mission in Islamabad. If one gives a read to the autobiography of Richard Nixon, the ex-president of America titled as “The Leaders” one can understand that use of undiplomatic and even derogatory language in diplomatic discussions is not an exception. Further, Pakistan is part of the capitalism which sets the prevailing economic, social and political order so when we have tied our knot with an international order the question of conspiracy loses its worth. To conclude, Khan’s conspiracy myth is nothing but a mirage and a debacle portraying a very bad impression of Pakistan as a state.
https://www.eurasiareview.com/06052022-imran-khans-conspiracy-myth-a-debacle-oped/
Rising Violence by Separatists Adds to Pakistan’s Lethal Instability
By Zia ur-Rehman
Shari Baluch was a 30-year-old mother of two children and a schoolteacher. Late last month, on a university campus in Karachi, Pakistan’s biggest city, she detonated a suicide bomb, killing herself and four others, including three Chinese teachers.Releasing a photo of her wearing fatigues and flashing a victory sign, the Baluchistan Liberation Army claimed responsibility, extending a recent wave of deadly attacks by Baluch separatists.
Baluch separatism is just one of the forces threatening the nation’s already tenuous unity and stability, including violent insurgencies by the Islamic State affiliate known as ISIS-K and the resurgent Pakistani Taliban.
An ethnically fragmented nation of more than 200 million people, Pakistan has long suffered from lack of economic development, corruption and volatile politics. The nuclear-armed military and its feared intelligence service exert significant influence over governments, and in the past have overthrown them.
Baluchistan is a large, arid province in southwestern Pakistan, bordering Iran and Afghanistan. It has rich mineral resources and a long coastline, but only about 12 million people across an area roughly the size of Germany. Since Pakistan’s founding in 1947, it has faced five insurgencies in the region, the most recent and persistent one underway since 2003.
Insurgent groups have fought repeatedly against political centralization and resource exploitation, in return facing heavy state repression and human rights abuses.
China’s Belt and Road Initiative is developing a Chinese-operated deepwater port in Gwadar, Baluchistan, and a transportation network linking Gwadar to China. Pakistan’s government views such foreign investment as vital, and is eager to strengthen ties with China as a counterweight to Pakistan’s archrival, India.
But to the separatists, the development projects put Beijing squarely on the side of the exploiters and oppressors, so in recent years, many targets of insurgent violence have been Chinese.In 2018, B.L.A. militants killed four people in an attack on the Chinese consulate in Karachi, and in 2020 the group mounted an assault on the Pakistan Stock Exchange in Karachi, which is 40 percent owned by Chinese investors, killing three people. In both cases, the assailants were also killed. Last August, a B.L.A. suicide bomber killed two children in an attack on Chinese nationals in Gwadar.
Ms. Baluch blew herself up last week near a van transporting Chinese language teachers for the Confucius Institute, a worldwide network of cultural centers financed by the Chinese government. The B.L.A. called the institute a “symbol of Chinese economic, cultural and political expansionism.” Chinese development work must stop, it threatened, “otherwise our future attacks will be even harsher.”Pakistan has long complained that Baluch separatists operated out of hide-outs in Afghanistan, while the former Afghan government often accused the Pakistani intelligence agency, the ISI, of aiding the Taliban. After the Chinese consulate attack in 2018, a suicide bomber killed the B.L.A. commander and several associates — not in Pakistan, but in Kandahar, Afghanistan. Afghan officials blamed the ISI for that bombing.By 2020, the Baluch insurgency had been greatly weakened by years of counterinsurgency operations, rifts among separatist groups, fatigue and government incentives for the militants to lay down their weapons.Pakistani officials hoped that the Taliban takeover last year would end Afghanistan’s use as a haven for Baluch insurgents. After the Gwadar attack, the Taliban detained and expelled a large number of families of separatists, according to Baluch insurgent groups. But the intensity and frequency of attacks started rising sharply last year, demonstrating the militants’ growing sophistication and aggressiveness. The number of terrorist attacks in Baluchistan nearly doubled in 2021 compared to 2020, according to the Pak Institute for Peace Studies, an Islamabad-based think tank, and the pace has kept rising this year. Insurgents have started resorting to suicide attacks, and the April 26 bombing in Karachi showed a new willingness to use women as assailants.In February, B.L.A. militants staged twin assaults on two military posts in Baluchistan. Pakistan’s military said that 20 attackers and nine military personnel were killed. Days earlier, an attack on another military post by a different group, the Baluch Liberation Front, killed 10 soldiers. The major separatist groups’ leadership has shifted in recent years from traditional tribal chieftains living in self-exile in Europe to more militant former student leaders. The groups have also formed an operational alliance to pool resources — one major reason the insurgency has intensified, security experts and officials said. They also link the insurgency’s upswing to its recruitment of youth, mainly students. The heads of two separatist groups formerly led a banned student group, the Baluch Students Organization-Azad, which operates clandestinely and, according to law enforcement officials, is a major source of insurgents. As a student, Ms. Baluch, the suicide bomber, was associated with the group, according to her family. “Exposure of Baluch students studying in the country’s prestigious universities, rising literacy and participation in ethnic politics are some major factors that have deepened awareness of socio-economic and political grievances among the youth,” said Muhammad Amir Rana, director of the Pak Institute for Peace Studies. In the town of Turbat, where Ms. Baluch taught science, a student claimed to have known at least five others who had joined the insurgency during the past two years. “They are mentally prepared to kill themselves for the cause,” said the student, who insisted on anonymity out of fear for his safety. Pakistan’s security agencies have cracked down on educated Baluch youth, forcibly “disappearing” suspected militants, sometimes for years, without trial, according to news reports, student advocates and human rights groups.“These days, law enforcement agencies consider every university student from Baluchistan a potential militant,” said Faisal Nawaz, a student from Panjgur, in Baluchistan, who is studying at the University of Karachi.Separatist attacks have been concentrated in the sparsely populated Makran region of Baluchistan, where residents depend on illegal cross-border trade with Iran in fuel and other commodities. In a desert area that has few job opportunities, smuggling can be a matter of survival. But the official border crossings were closed in March 2021, making the trade harder and worsening the misery of the local population.“If the government set up industries for us, the youth would not be involved in dangerous business,” said Sakhi Dad, 28, who said he took up smuggling after graduating from a university and failing to find other work. In November, a protest movement led by a Gwadar-based cleric, Maulana Hidayatur Rehman, mobilized thousands of people, calling on the government to address the plight of people in Makran. They demanded relaxation of border trade, easing of security checkpoints created to protect Chinese workers at the Gwadar port, and an end to illegal trawling that is devastating the livelihood of local fishermen. The government has responded with vows to improve conditions. On April 23, the new prime minister, Shehbaz Sharif, in a visit to Quetta, the capital of Baluchistan province, cited neglect of the region as a cause of violence, and promised to “raise the issue of forced disappearances with powerful quarters.” Pakistan’s military leadership has broadened its public interactions in Baluchistan, trying to present a friendlier face, particularly in Makran. After the February attacks, the army chief, Gen. Qamar Javed Bajwa, and other military leaders visited Baluchistan to meet political leaders and university students, and asked the local administration to open the border to trade. He also encouraged the youth to join law enforcement agencies. “For the first time, local leaders expressed their grievances and anger openly to the military’s leadership,” said a local political leader who attended the meeting with General Bajwa in Turbat in March. He requested anonymity to speak freely. “But without a political solution to bring an end to the long-running conflict, the insurgency will remain a challenge for Islamabad.” Less than two months after General Bajwa’s visit, Ms. Baluch carried out her suicide attack.
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/05/04/world/asia/pakistan-baluchistan-violence.html
#Pakistan #PPP - Telephone Call between the Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto and the U.S. Secretary of State
Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari received a telephone call today from the United States Secretary of State, Antony Blinken.
During the phone call, Secretary Blinken congratulated Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari on the assumption of his Office and expressed the desire to continue strengthening the mutually beneficial Pakistan-U.S. bilateral relationship.
Exchanging views on various aspects of Pakistan-U.S. relations, the Foreign Minister underscored that Pakistan and the United States have a longstanding broad-based relationship. He added that constructive and sustained engagement between the two countries on the basis of mutual respect and mutual interest was vital to promote peace, development, and security in the region and beyond. The Foreign Minister emphasized that Pakistan’s vision was focused on human development, regional connectivity, and a peaceful neighborhood.
Building on the Pakistan-U.S. cooperation in dealing with the Covid pandemic during the last two years, Secretary Blinken invited Pakistan to the Second Global Covid Summit to be held virtually later this month. An invitation was also extended by the Secretary of State for Pakistan’s participation in the Ministerial meeting on Global Food Security to be held in New York on 18 May 2022.
The Foreign Minister and the Secretary of State agreed to remain in contact and enhance engagement on regional and global issues of mutual interest.
https://www.ppp.org.pk/pr/26960/
آرمی چیف کو گورنر کے خط پر رضا ربانی کا ردعمل
سینیٹر رضا ربانی نے کہا ہے کہ آئینی بحران پر گورنر پنجاب کا آرمی چیف کو مبینہ خط پی ٹی آئی کا دُہرا معیار بے نقاب کرتا ہے۔
پاکستان پیپلزپارٹی (پی پی پی) کے سینیٹر رضا ربانی کا کہنا ہے کہ اگر ادارے آئین کے ساتھ کھڑے ہوں تو انہیں تضحیک کا نشانہ بنایا جاتا ہے، خط پی ٹی آئی کے عہدے داروں کے ذریعے آئین کی خلاف ورزی کی دانستہ کڑی کو ظاہر کرتا ہے۔
انہوں نے کہا کہ سپریم کورٹ اور لاہور ہائی کورٹ آئینی ذمے داری ادا کرتے ہوئے آئین کی خلاف ورزی کو روک رہی تھیں، سپریم کورٹ اور لاہور ہائی کورٹ کے خلاف مہم چلائی گئی۔
رضا ربانی کا کہنا تھا کہ سیاسی لڑائی کو قواعد، قانون اور آئین کے دائرے میں رہ کر طے کیا جائے۔
واضح رہے کہ 4 مئی کو گورنر پنجاب عمر سرفراز چیمہ نے آرمی چیف جنرل قمر جاوید باجوہ کو خط لکھ کر پنجاب کی موجودہ صورتحال میں کردار ادا کرنے کی اپیل کی تھی۔
خط میں آرمی چیف سے پنجاب میں آئینی فریم ورک پر عمل درآمد، وفاقی اور صوبائی حکومتوں پر عوامی اعتماد بحال کرنے کے لیے کردار ادا کرنے کی بھی اپیل کی گئی ہے۔
https://jang.com.pk/news/1082939
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