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Make Terrorist States Pay a Heavy Price
Editorial Team
The decision to continue Pakistan’s suspension from
the Commonwealth was overshadowed by the Zimbabwe crisis in Nigeria. Announcing
Islamabad’s non-qualification to participate in decision-making the
Commonwealth, the foreign ministers action group stressed that not enough
reforms toward democracy had taken place under General Muharraf’s reign to merit
readmission of his recalcitrant country. This confirmed yet again that Pakistan
remains a pariah state in international diplomatic fora, however much wheeling
and dealing with the United States secures World Bank loans and pats from Geoge
W Bush. If America were in the Commonwealth, there is little doubt that
Musharraf would have released another Al Qaeda trading card in exchange for
readmission leverage.
The Commonwealth’s Harare Declaration of 1991 sates democratic freedoms,
fundamental human rights, equality of women etc as cornerstones which no member
state can derogate. Unfortunately, at the time of this Declaration, export of
international terrorism was not on the radar screen of the world and it was not
included as another ground for exclusion from the Commonwealth. Pakistan
deserves to be suspended from all peace-loving international bodies like the
Commonwealth purely on the weight of evidence regarding its involvement in
habouring, training, financing and infiltrating mujahideen of various
nationalities including its own citizens.
As a potent
threat to world peace and a destabilising factor in South Asia, Pakistan must be
made to pay a heavy price for its irresponsible actions. The Commonwealth should
remember that it was Benazir Bhutto’s democratically elected Pakistani
government that hatched the Taliban poison. Her father, Zulfiqar Bhutto, was
another elected thug who abetted the genocide of Bangladeshis in 1971. Democracy
alone is not a cure-all, as has been proved in the case of Pakistan. Democracy’s
populist overtones can sometimes be worse than unrepresentative military rule.
If the Commonwealth desires positive change in Pakistan, it should make the
price of terrorism intolerable rather than harping on and on about restoration
of democracy. An unambiguous declaration to uphold Islamabad’s suspension until
it is determined that it has stopped exporting terrorism is sorely wanting. |
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