China's concern

Beijing's concerns on the dilapidated security situation in Pakistan should ring alarm bells. It is a reality that Chinese interests, and those of other foreign investors, are constantly under fire from non-state actors, and despite contingency plans these unscrupulous actors are scot-free. This has impacted progress on multibillion dollar CPEC projects, and the reservations expressed by Chinese Ambassador Jiang Zaidong are well-founded and need to be addressed on a war footing. In a rare public disclosure, the envoy aired the security-related grievances of his countrymen involved in development projects in Pakistan. To the embarrassment of our security profile, Chinese engineers were made to bleed twice in six months, and this is where the Chinese patience seems to be wearing thin.

The ambassador's remarks calling the terrorist attacks "unacceptable" unfortunately demonstrates the unpleasantness in bilateralism that has set in. Chinese officials have time and again highlighted this enigma, but it seems the irritant has graduated to the highest level. Pakistan has done all in its capacity to vanquish the evil. The fact that the revulsion is still there hints at foreign connection. It goes without saying that extraterritorial characters have made inroads in the restive provinces of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan and found a host of abettors. This is where the problem rests, calling for a detailed mopping of disgruntled elements on the pattern of counterterror operations carried out in the erstwhile tribal areas bordering Afghanistan.

Pakistan's fragility in terms of security and political instability has been a constant, and calls for putting the house in order. The CPEC investment, demonstrating Beijing's confidence in Pakistan, had come at a time when the chips were down, and a decade of progression has uplifted the country in the realms of energy, logistics and communication. That success should not go down the drain, as we embark on the second leg of industrialisation and connectivity under CPEC. Let's join heads and synergies to exterminate the terror nexus.