Here you go from the Nation...
UNs real face | Pakistan | News | Newspaper | Daily | English | Online
For those who still believe that the United Nations has not become the handmaiden of big and
influential Western powers, led by the US, would have problem justifying Kashmir’s omission
from the report of the Security Council containing the list of long-standing disputes on its agenda.
This grave lapse must be seen in the backdrop of the fact that since Obama opened his eyes in
the White House and was taken in by the outward glare of India’s potential, howsoever dicey it
might ultimately prove to be, to serve as the US surrogate in the region, he has become blind to
the reality of atrocities that the Indian security forces are committing day in and day out in the
occupied Valley. In the din of the propaganda of his team of the Indian origin advisors, he no
longer hears the cries of agony of the orphaned, the widowed, the raped or the tortured Kashmiri
people – the outcome of the brutal and illegal hold of India – that Candidate Obama felt could be
brought to an end through a just solution of the dispute in line with the aspirations of the people of
the state. With this policy change, the US President felt quite comfortable with extending his
country’s backing to India’s bid for a permanent seat at the UN Security Council whose Charter it
has massively violated.
The UNSC’s was a studied omission; and to call it an inadvertent lapse, as Pakistan’s acting
Permanent Representative at the UN did, is a travesty of fact, an inexcusably timid reaction from
a country directly concerned with the issue and the country to which the beleaguered Kashmiris
look up for support. The terming it as inadvertency simply amounts to ditching the Kashmiris, and
deserves to be condemned unreservedly. One reason for the UNSC’s turnaround is
Washington’s strategic decision to woo India at all costs in the vain expectation that New Delhi
would live up to its wishes of checkmating the spread of Beijing’s influence in the region. The
other is the reality of the economic benefit that the US would be able to draw from a strategic
partner in need of foreign goods and technology its corporate sector would be able to meet.
This and a host of other signs unmistakably suggest that the Americans have opted for India as a
strategic ally and, since Pakistan and India cannot go along together unless their disputes are
amicably settled that the US is unwilling to try for fear that it might lose India’s favours, dropping
Pakistan when it has served its purpose in the wrongly called war on terror. The pity is that
despite clear indications and warnings from friendly voices, our ruling leadership does not seem
to accept this reality. The sooner it realises that our salvation lies in changing the direction of our
hopes and expectations the lesser the damage the US flirtation with us could cause.
Question, why then is it still a disputed territory today? Does it serve simply as a political bargaining chip?
