Speakers at a seminar held here on Monday stressed upon the need of formulating people-oriented national security, economic and social policies observing that the successive governments were responsible for criminally compromising security of the country and bad economic situation. Former secretary general of the Foreign Affairs of Pakistan, Mohmmad Akram Zaki, defence and security analyst Lt-Gen (r) Asad Durrani, media analyst Syed Talat Hussain and SDPI Executive Director Dr Abid Qaiyum Suleri made these observations during a seminar called “Violations and threats to Pakistan’s sovereignty and Response”. The conference was organised by the Sustainable Development Policy Institute (SDPI) here.
Speakers were of the view that no country was completely sovereign and Pakistan had been struggling for its complete sovereignty since its creation.
They said the near economic future of the country seemed really grim due to worsening energy crises and gas shortages amid increasing demand.
Dr Suleri said the IMF-government’s inconclusive agreement and the reluctance of the former to issue letter of comfort to the government for loans from other institutions would have a significant impact.
He added that among four levels of security— involving individual, national, regional and global, the last three dimensions had been well-taken care of at the cost of individual security which put the country into a difficult situation to deal with arising challenges at external and internal fronts.
Akram Zaki said the country was going through multiple crises as the security situation at western, eastern and at internal fronts had worsened. He said initial alliance between US and Pakistan was on wrong notations as Pakistan thought it was getting strong against India and US intended to secure low-cost soldiers to protect its interests in the region.
He highlighted varying phases of Pak-US relations and lamented that Pakistan never formulated its national security, economic, social and development policies amid going through different phases of ad-hoc decision-making approach.
He urged the government to follow a policy of dialogue with caution, patience and firmness and it should explore options for coordination with Iran, China, Russia and Turkey.
He said the US was not going to withdraw from Afghanistan but it was changing its role from a combating player to a long-term strategic presence involving India as its partner.
He said India had adopted a new strategy which involved weakening of Pakistan from western side focusing Balochistan and Fata, strengthening control of flow of waters of Pakistan and thirdly having an offensive doctrine of military deployment on the eastern-side.
Speakers lamented that the real causes of Pakistan’s poor sovereignty were absence of governance, incapacitated or paralysed decision-making at all levels, collective resignation or inaction to the challenges, and a weak role of the civil society.
They said Pakistan had been taking actions against militant groups on its territory while US kept asking to do more due to its international agenda and the security situation in Afghanistan.
