Zaheer Bhatti
AS soon as a leading Indian-planted active naval
Officer Kalbhoshan Yadev was captured in
Balochistan operating a terrorist network in Pakistan, tried, awarded death penalty awaiting execution, it is no coincidence that political and economic screws have been tightened over the country, as has always been the case whenever Pakistan was in a take-off mode. FATF is an imperial instrument besides the IMF, the World Bank and the ADB, and the periodical economic sanctions which are being used to sort out and tame half-compliant countries like Pakistan to imperial economic diktats and tightening stranglehold over their politics and economy. While in the first place, the Pakistani nation is yet to know as to where from this clog in the wheel emerged, it ought to have been ascertained on what count and evidence the country was placed on the so-called Financial Action Task Force watch list. And now with the conviction of Hafiz Saeed, one of the leading philanthropists in the country over an ambiguous charge of aiding terrorism, it is the right of all Pakistani Citizens to be made aware of the precise crimes committed by this otherwise highly rated social dignitary, besides allegation against a number of others the authorities acquiesced and reportedly proceeded against.
If all this was true, the nation demands of the Pakistani Government to openly share concrete evidence of terrorism by Hafiz Saeed and those others with the public to justify the punishment awarded to them so that the gods we create out of such men in our estimations, are promptly brought down and destroyed. But if the conviction turns out to be an act of the Pakistan Government to merely appease and fulfil FATF yardsticks blindfolded in an attempt to be struck off the supposed grey list of the Instrument without probing or questioning the efficacy of the charges, it would amount to shameful admission of unsubstantiated Indian allegations about Hafiz Saeed’s involvement in terror attacks inside India and Kashmir which led to proscribing him and Lashkar-e-Tayyaba by the United Nations, followed by Pakistan in compliance with the UN Order, whereas he had been held in custody several times before but released for lack of evidence by the courts of law in Pakistan.
As is evidenced by several instances in the past, Pakistan not only did not stand with its citizens to vindicate their honour and failed to challenge the frame-up against them but also back-stabbed staunch supporters of the Kashmir freedom struggle and in the process also helped India to divert world attention from its own misdeeds inside Pakistan of which besides a number of others from time to time Pakistan currently holds Kalbhoshan Yadev, but no action is taken against India by the demi-gods on earth. India actually weary and badly hurt due to Hafiz Saeed’s unflinching support to the Kashmiri cause of freedom as it is of the entire Pakistani nation, has been gunning for the great man. And whereas the people of Kashmir are legally entitled to freedom by choice, they besides political, moral and diplomatic support are entitled to active military assistance from any quarters to attain their cherished goal, for which the time is now without fear of being sectioned.
The Pakistani Government ought to have taken India to the Criminal Court of Justice for wrongly implicating names like Hafiz Saeed and Maulana Masood Azhar and confusing their support to the Kashmir Liberation struggle with terrorism. It should not be paying mere lip-service against Indian mayhem in occupied Kashmir, nor remained silent over a Kashmiri vendor Afzal Guru’s clandestine conviction and burial in Tihar jail by labelling him a terrorist in the self-staged Delhi Parliament attack, or the Ajmal Qassaab Mumbai drama by India projecting him as a Pakistan-sent terrorist; a concoction busted even by the famed Elias Davidson journalistic probe, as another self-staged Indian encounter.
Pakistan, which occasionally clamours over trampling of its sovereignty, has inherited the legacy of being managed by the United States; its foreign master opted by default by Pakistan’s first Prime Minister in preference to powers in the region, ever since the untimely departure of its true leader the Quaid-i-Azam. The United States has a long trail of carrot and stick approach to managing its so-called top non-NATO ally Pakistan, which rather than cultivating as a true friend, it always used. The first clear instance of a deteriorating US-Pakistan relationship was the imposition of American sanctions on Pakistan in 1965. What followed worsened bilateral ties as the US on many occasions subjected Pakistan to unilateral sanction regimes. But after 9/11, it decided to lift all sanctions to suit immediate American interests with the beginning of its war in Afghanistan which compelled the US to seek imperative Pakistani assistance.
Sadly though, Pervez Musharraf, Pakistan’s self-appointed President in uniform after a military coup, complied far beyond the asking by not just providing military bases to launch attacks into Muslim Afghanistan but also arrested and presented to his masters over 600 Pakistanis raising their voice against the imperial aggression into Afghanistan which after 19 unproductive years the mighty of the world is being forced to vacate. But those 600 prisoners of conscience have never been heard of since nor has any political leadership in the country ever taken up their case with the usurpers, leave alone the brash 80-years conviction of a frail Dr Afia Siddiqui, absurdly charged for snatching a burly US Marine’s gun; and an affluent Saifullah Paracha Chairman of 35 social welfare organizations in Karachi, assisting Afghan reconstruction through Osama Bin Laden after post-Soviet American desertion, who was wrongly ensnared by America’s war on terror along with his son. Saifullah Paracha the oldest prisoner in Guantánamo Bay will probably die in detention without ever being charged, as will his American-born son Uzair who is currently in a US prison sentenced for 30 years; both accused of aiding Al-Qaeda; a charge recently refuted by the principal Guantanamo detainees but held for almost 16 years now.
—The writer is a media professional, member of Pioneering team of PTV and a veteran ex Director Programmes.
