U-turns and blind propaganda
Not so kind of the foreign office to muddy the waters once again by its ‘Taliban not operating from Pakistan’ statement the other day. Perhaps somebody there would have remembered that the last official position on the matter was given by the ministry’s front-man Sartaj Aziz himself. This was just before the Quadrilateral Coordination Group (QCG) collapsed. Finally we admitted, after year upon year of denial, that we did actually house some of the Afghan Taliban leadership, but only for arm-twisting purposes. And since the Quadrilateral’s twilight was as urgent an arm-twist moment as any, and Pakistan apparently couldn’t twist effectively enough, the QCG, too, was rubbished to the dustbin of history forever.
Some ‘senior analysts’ are already attributing this new u-turn, or discrepancy of sorts, to the ministry being rudderless – since there’s not been a full-time foreign minister this cycle. But the stand-in foreign minister, the prime minister actually, is not too transparent on the terrorism matter either. Speaking to parliamentarians in Sarajevo – not his most mesmerising performance – Nawaz boldly claimed that not only had Pakistan destroyed all al Qaeda and Taliban bases, but ISIS too did not exist at all in the country. Since the foreign minister and prime minister’s statement about his country’s most pressing problem is almost completely inaccurate, it seems the future of dealing with terrorism, etc, will be like the pre-operation days – big on rhetoric and low on real action.
True, Zarb-e-Azb has changed the narrative of militancy in the country. But we still have a long way to go. And some of our friends, as well as detractors, have a point when they express frustration because we contradict ourselves so often. This ambiguity is at the heart of the split with Washington and the ill will with Kabul, not that either holds our interests supreme when deciding their respective courses. But we’ll have to be careful in carving our future diplomatic route as well. Just as we’re headed for a security huddle with the Russians and Chinese on Dec27, we must realise that they are also rock solid in their determination to eliminate terrorists, especially of the Islamist persuasion, forever. We’d better do our homework and not look so awkward in this new alignment.