Plain speaking at the UN

Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif addressed the United Nations General Assembly on September 27^th and made a slightly sombre but wide-ranging speech. It was in part wishful thinking, because no matter how unequivocal his condemnation of drone strikes by the Americans and the civilian casualties that result from them, as long as there are targets the Americans will go after them. Domestic politics demanded the denunciation, but the prime minister will have known he was shouting at the wind. In other parts, it was an affirmation of solidarity, particularly for the people of Palestine, and in yet others an outline of where Pakistan stood on a range of international issues such as the Syrian conflict and the need to eliminate Syria’s chemical arsenal. There was an admission that Pakistan and India had wasted ‘massive resources’ in the race to acquire nuclear arms, but no mention was made of the steady expansion of our nuclear arsenal and delivery systems. The thread than ran throughout was terrorism, be it domestic or international, and an understanding that terror had ‘gone global’ in the last decade.

Afghanistan and India got special mention, and the prime minister was adamant that the peace initiatives with India would go ahead, citing the need to build on the 1999 Lahore accords. He is due to meet Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on September 28 as part of this process, both men rising above the heat generated by recent incidents on the Line of Control. Reference was also made to Kashmir, and the prime minister pointedly referred to the fact that the Kashmir issue had been on the UN Security Council table since January 1948 with no sign of resolution. There were positive words about the relationship between Pakistan and Afghanistan which is gaining ever-greater importance as the 2014 watershed draws near, but it is going to take more than a speech to repair the many rips in a tattered political fabric. There were no surprises and it was a workmanlike national position statement as well as a broad statement of future intent. Crafting intent into concrete action is going to take statesmanship, and therein lies the challenge.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 29^th, 2013.

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