KARACHI:
UN Secretary-General António Guterres dashed to Pakistan on September 9 to see the damage caused by the recent floods. Warmly welcomed to the country, the UN chief met the Prime Minister, the foreign minister and the Army Chief among others. He visited flood-hit areas accompanied by the PM to see the destruction caused by the floods and the plight of the people in those areas. After seeing the destruction of property, livestock, infrastructure and crops, the Secretary General sent out an appeal to the global community for urgent help. He promised that he would do his best to mobilise the global community to come to the rescue of Pakistan in these troubling times.
Our leadership, especially the PM, was behaving as if Guterres himself had the power to force the international community to help Pakistan. The PM was at times behaving in a way even worthy of his position. For example, the PM acted as the Secretary-General’s translator which looked ridiculous. Giving protocol to any dignitary is fine but acting like beggars with no self-respect is unwarranted. Most importantly, having high expectations of the UN — a toothless body with no clout over the rich and powerful countries — is nothing more than a dream. The UN has miserably failed to come to the rescue of people in Kashmir or Palestine among others. It is just a glorified form of the League of Nations with little or no influence on the international community. Therefore, I would advise the leadership not to expect much of the UN, and work on other ways of dealing with this tragedy of infinite proportions.
Raja Shafaatullah
Islamabad
Published in The Express Tribune, September 14th, 2022.
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