EDITORIAL: As the United States walked out on Afghanistan leaving the country bled white the no-less-hurt Pakistan has decided to rethink its with relationship with Washington. And how far in that direction Pakistan has come, Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi spelled out in some detail at a think tank seminar.
“Looking towards the future, we do not want a transactional relationship with the US. We want multifaceted ties that are not susceptible to the vagaries of regional and international polices,” according to him. Simply stated, the foreign minister said it loud and clear that Pakistan will not be a party in the cold war that seems to be commencing between the United States and China.
As Pakistan’s relationship with China, which is essentially of economic nature but misunderstood as geopolitical and geostrategic by the West, gains momentum, particularly in the framework of the China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) Washington has turned increasingly hostile. Ever since Joe Biden’s election as president the US government has cold-shouldered Pakistani leadership. Even a telephonic contact between the US president and Prime Minister Imran Khan has not materialized, although the former has been making frequent contacts with Indian and other leaders. And to this PM Khan is believed to have reacted by refusing to be part of “Conference of Democracy” hosted by President Biden.
After years of being so-called most allied ally Pakistan has come to realize that its relationship with the United States was never a lasting proposition; that is was only a time-serving transactional arrangement. Whenever the United States was in trouble in Afghanistan Pakistan was asked to ‘do more’, and Pakistan willingly obliged and bore the heavy burden in terms of life and property. But whenever Pakistan was in trouble – as was the case during East Pakistan crisis in 1971 when the Seventh Fleet did not sail for the then East Pakistan in order to help a fellow member in the framework of Southeast Asia Treaty Organisation (SEATO). Rightly then Pakistan has decided to remain non-aligned in any superpower rivalry. Pakistan would like to have its international relationships with other states in the context of Non-Aligned Movement (NAM).
And to one’s surprise even in that indifferent, if not hostile American mindset, there is space to work on and help Washington understand and accept that Pakistan has made a strategic pivot from geopolitical to geo-economics by positioning itself as a country with excellent regional connectivity. According to the foreign minister, the US Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman has contacted him to inform him that her government wants to deepen its relationship with Pakistan “beyond its involvement in Afghanistan”. Should that be the case Islamabad would rightly expect Washington to weigh in with India to unlock the door on Pakistan and discuss bilateral complications, particularly those in the context of Kashmir.
But Pakistan’s quest for peace and geo-economic strength cannot be a solo performance, the minister said, adding that “It take two to tango”. To the West whose eyes are closed to Indian atrocities in Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir FM Qureshi reminded that the Indian atrocities there are “too egregious to be masked by the veneer of secularism and democratic pretensions”. So as Pakistan sets out on the journey to redefine its foreign policy objectives it has to ensure that its new posture is not misunderstood as de-prioritizing of its economic and financial relations with the West. It must make abundantly clear to the governments in Europe and North America and financial giants that its relationship with China is of economical nature and not a defence agreement.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2021
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