A friend in need is a friend indeed, goes an old adage. Ask a Pakistani if the dictum is still good and he will say, indeed it is.
Pakistan is proud of its steadfast friend, China. An oft-repeated slogan says the two countries’ friendship is deeper than the ocean and higher than the Himalayas.
Recently, at the UN in New York, China served a reminder to the world that it’s commitment to Pakistan was more than sloganeering when it helped its friend, once again, to dodge the UN Sanctions Committee on Islamic State and al-Qaeda.
The US, UK and France—sharing membership with China on the committee—had moved a resolution to have the Pakistan-based Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) chief Masood Azhar, declared a global terrorist. However, China scuttled the move on a mere technicality; it needed more time to study and evaluate whether Azhar’s shenanigans justified a place for him on the ignoble list.
It wasn’t the first time that China bailed Pakistan out of a tight corner. It had rendered the same service to its all-weather friend, in 2016 and 2017, to keep Azhar beyond the reach of the sanctions committee on similar technicalities. It didn’t think, on those occasions, that there was enough evidence to nail Azhar as a global terrorist, a la Osama bin Laden.
The move against him, this time around, had better credentials. It had the Pulwama carnage in the perspective, which raised the expectations of India and its western friends for a different outcome. By the same token, Pakistan had more to be concerned with the possibility of an outcome qualitatively different than before, which could only raise the stakes against it at a time of a tense, eye-ball to eye-ball, stand-off with India where both are staring down each other in a battle of wrecking nerves.
Pakistan may well have dodged the bullet at the UN, courtesy of its tested friend. But it doesn’t make it any easier for it to end the menace of terrorism that has been plaguing it for so long on both domestic and international fronts.
Apart from putting it at loggerheads with immediate neighbours, like India and Afghanistan, the monster of terrorism has exacted a heavy toll in lives and loss of property at home. Pakistani leaders and spokesmen never fail to remind their audience, worldwide, that ever since joining America’s war on terror, 17 years ago, Pakistan has lost more than 70,000 civilians and soldiers in its battles against terrorists, besides incurring a loss of tens of billions of dollars.
It’s not only that in China that Pakistan has a reliable foil on the international front but for the first time it has a leader who isn’t shy to take on terrorism.
Imran Khan’s detractors at home may have routinely sullied his image in the past as ‘Taliban Khan’ for point scoring but he has proved them wrong by taking on the extremist and fascist politico-religious outfits—like JeM and JuD (Jamaat-ud-Dawa), successor to erstwhile LeT (Lashkar-e-Taiba) and headed by the notorious Hafiz Saeed—head on since becoming Pakistan’s leader last summer.
In the wake of last month’s Pulwama incident, and the ensuing bloody duel with India, Imran has come down hard on these radical extra-state actors. Days before China throwing his government a lifeline, Imran cracked down harshly on both JeM and JuD, seizing their assets, arresting hundreds of their followers and putting both Masood Azhar and Hafiz Saeed under house arrest.Azhar’s son, fire-belching like his fanatical father, has been jailed.
Even the so-called humanitarian and social-welfare activities of these outfits have come under government scrutiny. They will henceforth be overseen by official administrators to ensure they don’t use their humanitarian foil for fascist endeavours.
What’s novel in Imran’s bid to sever the fiend’s head is taking all the madrassas (religious seminaries) under government control. These madrassas have been seen as the hatcheries breeding future terrorists. Imran’s move is, thus, unique in aiming to drain the swamp.
The long overdue course-correction by Imran on an issue that has had Pakistan in its thrall for over two decades is a stitch in time. The Pulwama attack may have provided him with just the right calculus to go on the offensive against those who have used religious angularities and sensitivities to augment their fascist agendas. Imran’s political opponents may blame him for succumbing to outside pressure. Be that as it may, but what he’s doing is in the best interests of Pakistan itself.
Religious fanaticism of a rabid species has morphed into a rampant culture of terrorism. Nihilistic preaching from the pulpit has brainwashed a whole generation of Pakistanis and afflicted their psyche in ways unthinkable in Pakistan’s early years. A young,viciously indoctrinated, college student recently killed his professor in Bahawalpur, central Punjab, because he wouldn’t denounce saying ‘welcome’
as un-Islamic. Back to the Stone Age?
Karamatullah K Ghori
Former Pakistani diplomat
Email: K_K_ghori@hotmail.com