A new foreign minister
Ms Khar has shown in her relatively brief career as a politician that she is quite capable of going about her mission.
Fresh air blowing through the often stagnant realm of political life is usually a rarity. It blows in only now and then and this time seems to have done so with the appointment of Hina Rabbani Khar as Pakistan’s new foreign minister. Ms Khar breaks away from the conventional image of persons entrusted to such key portfolios. In the first place, she is a woman; in the second she is young. We must hope these factors alone can bring in some fresh thinking into the running of foreign policy and how to improve Pakistan’s declining standing in the region. Ms Khar has shown over her relatively brief career as a politician that she is quite capable of going about her mission with determination and sincerity. This is what the Pakistan Foreign Office needs right now. There have been too many months of floundering, bickering and uncertainty.
Some issues, however, go beyond the questions of who is acting as minister. It is essential to the needs of Pakistan and its people that its foreign policy be an independent one, with parliament exercising control over it as should be in the case of a democracy, with the military establishment in the background. Of course, this is easier said than done, and hence the perception that the Foreign Office acts on the dictates of the establishment will be hard to change any time soon. On some issues, such as ties with India and the US, the civilians need to assert themselves and if they did it could have a positive outcome — certainly in the case of India where all political parties want greater engagement with it. Foreign policy should be based on the wishes and aspirations of the people of Pakistan as express through their elected representatives and should not be based on other extraneous factors.
This will be one of the main challenges Ms Khar faces in the future. She also takes over her assignment at a time when there is friction with the US and a degree of doubt over how things should proceed with Washington. All these matters will need to be addressed and worked out in the coming days. We believe Ms Khar has the capability and the capacity of doing this in a professional and intelligent manner. The future in terms of foreign policy may be brighter than before.
Published in The Express Tribune, July 21st, 2011.
Some issues, however, go beyond the questions of who is acting as minister. It is essential to the needs of Pakistan and its people that its foreign policy be an independent one, with parliament exercising control over it as should be in the case of a democracy, with the military establishment in the background. Of course, this is easier said than done, and hence the perception that the Foreign Office acts on the dictates of the establishment will be hard to change any time soon. On some issues, such as ties with India and the US, the civilians need to assert themselves and if they did it could have a positive outcome — certainly in the case of India where all political parties want greater engagement with it. Foreign policy should be based on the wishes and aspirations of the people of Pakistan as express through their elected representatives and should not be based on other extraneous factors.
This will be one of the main challenges Ms Khar faces in the future. She also takes over her assignment at a time when there is friction with the US and a degree of doubt over how things should proceed with Washington. All these matters will need to be addressed and worked out in the coming days. We believe Ms Khar has the capability and the capacity of doing this in a professional and intelligent manner. The future in terms of foreign policy may be brighter than before.
Published in The Express Tribune, July 21st, 2011.