Danish MP opposes Western push on Pakistan

Nadeem Farooque questions legality of US drone strikes in tribal regions.

COPENHAGAN:

A young Danish lawmaker of Pakistani origin says that the United States and its Western allies should stop pressuring Pakistan to do more to counter militancy and terrorism.

“Now, it’s their turn to help Pakistan wriggle out of this spiral of deadly violence,” the lawmaker, Nadeem Farooque, told a group of senior editors from Pakistan at his office in the Danish Parliament.

Thousands of Pakistani civilians and troops have been killed in suicide attacks and bomb explosions set off by Taliban insurgents since the country sided with the United States in the war against terrorism. But the Western nations believe Pakistan is not doing enough.

The 34-year-old also opposed CIA’s covert war in Pakistan’s tribal regions and questioned the legality of drone attacks. Missile strikes by US pilot-less aircraft in Pakistan have triggered a controversy with lawyers calling fatalities in such attacks “extrajudicial killings”.

Farooque is the spokesperson for the Social Democratic Party, which has seven seats in the 179-member Danish Parliament. Traditionally, smaller parties have been ruling Denmark and leader of Farooque’s party, Helle Thorning-Schmidt, is heading the incumbent ruling coalition.

Farooque, who was born and bred in Denmark, is aware of Pakistan’s economic woes. “For economic activity in Pakistan, you need to have political stability and peace,” he said in highly Danish-accented English. “Once there is stability and security, international investment will pour in automatically,” he added.

Farooque hasn’t done much to help improve Denmark’s relations with Pakistan. Neither does he have plans for this. He concedes this. But this shouldn’t be misconstrued as lack of interest on his part. “I was elected to the Parliament only a couple of months ago.  And “I’ll welcome if you give me suggestions,” he asked the Pakistani editors.

After the Turkish immigrants, Pakistanis are the largest community in Denmark. But Farooq believes the 25,000-strong Pakistani Diaspora is not well organised compared to other communities in this Scandinavian country of five million.

He admitted that there is a lot of stereotyping of Pakistan because of the security situation there. “In social circles, I’ve had a lot of debates on this – I used to try to correct Pakistan’s image here and tell the Danes the contributions Pakistan has made to global security,” he said.

“Having said that, I believe there is no discrimination in Denmark on the basis of nationality, ethnicity, religion or language,” Farooque said.

Pakistan, earlier, figured nowhere in the priority list of Denmark. But, Farooq believes the trend is changing now and the new centre-left government in Copenhagen is trying to improve its understanding of Pakistan.

Denmark has over 600 combat troops as part of the US-led Nato coalition in Afghanistan. And the country has lost nearly 50 soldiers in combat operations since the toppling of the Taliban regime in the country. Interestingly, the issue is a taboo in Denmark, or it seems so, because few people, be they bureaucrats or politicians, are willing to discuss it.

Farooque, however, was candid enough to speak on the issue. His party supports the Afghan mission – but at the same time calls for pursuing non-military solution to the crisis. “My party has a progressive and balanced approach vis-à-vis international disputes, be it Afghanistan, Palestinian-Israelis or any other crisis,” he said.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 6^th, 2011.