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| India-Pakistan |
| Obama's India visit is Pakistan's wake-up call |
| 2010-11-11 |
[Emirates 24/7] The symbolism, trade deals and fine words of Barack B.O.Obama's courtship of India should be Pakistain's wake-up call to fix its economy and eradicate Islamist militancy to ward off isolation, analysts say. The US president declared India a world power, the India-US alliance "one of the defining partnerships of the 21st century" and unveiled deals worth $10 billion designed to create 50,000 American jobs in an ailing economy. Going further than any US president before, he backed India's quest for a permanent seat on the UN Security Council, although with no immediate prospect of reform and likely strong Chinese opposition, it was a largely symbolic move. Just weeks after Pakistain's latest round of "strategic dialogue" with the US in a bid to overcome mistrust, the warm embrace between Obama and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh stood in stark contrast. "Paks have to be more realistic on understanding India's growing international role," political analyst Hasan Askari told AFP. "India is investing in the United States while our economy is in bad shape. There is no Pak investment in the West, very little in the Middle East. We ask for money from the United States, while India does not." Indian deals will funnel $10 billion into the US economy, while under a US Congress bill American taxpayers fork out $1.5 billion a year for development in Pakistain with promises of another $2 billion in military assistance. While Obama's visit reflects the shift in power to emerging nations since the financial crisis, Pakistain is a client state with a Taliban and Al-Qaeda presence plotting to kill US soldiers and fanning the war in Afghanistan. Pakistain, whose status as a nuclear power still alarms the West, has been stifled by decades of military rule, recession and Islamisation. Its security forces are fighting a Taliban insurgency in the northwest. Bomb attacks have killed thousands nationwide and its tribal belt is considered an Al-Qaeda headquarters subject to a covert US drone war. Writing in The News daily, public policy consultant Mosharraf Zaidi said the only lesson to draw from Obama's visit was "the deals being made". "While we drown in the inanities of this country's infinite and perpetual search for identity, we are deepening our current bankruptcy, and ensuring a future of mostly begging for handouts." With Obama visiting Indonesia, APEC in Japan and the G20 in South Korea, Zaidi said: "The reason he is not visiting Pakistain is obvious. Pakistain does not belong on that list of countries and that is not India's fault". Analysts say Islamabad should soften its foreign policy, dominated by the anti-Indian military, to avoid isolation as the United States looks to end the war against the Afghan Taliban which Pakistain helped to create. "In today's world, defeat can be described in one way only: international isolation... Pakistain must learn to be more objective about the crisis it is facing internally," wrote The Express Tribune in an editorial. "Pakistain can sort out this crisis through self-correction." |
| Posted by:Fred |
| #3 "While we drown in the inanities of this country's infinite and perpetual search for identity, we are deepening our current bankruptcy, and ensuring a future of mostly begging for handouts." Too True! |
| Posted by: Paul2 2010-11-11 12:30 |
| #2 Even Winston Churchill commented on Islamic countries being backward.How can they take over the world when most of their countries are skint/not business minded.Take away the Oil and Tourism in Dubai what are they left with? |
| Posted by: Paul2 2010-11-11 12:27 |
| #1 Pakistain is a failed state. Get over it. Continuing on your current path will lead to an inevitable losing nuke exchange with India, once the Whacko Islamists complete their ascension |
| Posted by: Frank G 2010-11-11 09:24 |